Between 2023 and 2024, the price of Nvidia’s shares experienced a spectacular boom, in some ways even similar to that of Bitcoin.
However, these are two very different assets that are following different paths, so the only thing they really have in common is the boom in financial markets.
Summary
The first price boom of Nvidia stocks: the stock follows Bitcoin
The Nvidia title (ticker NVDA) began trading on the Nasdaq even in the last century.
Until 2015 it had a fairly classic trend, with a boom during the speculative bubble of the dot-com at the end of the last century, when the price of its shares went from about $0.5 to over $3.5 in just 12 months, not followed by a big crash.
For example, in January 2002, it even reached over $6 for a brief moment.
Until 2015 inclusive, that is for a total of 14 consecutive years, it continued to fluctuate between about $0.7 and $9, on levels increasingly higher than those of 1998, but not much higher than those of 2002.
Although the most spectacular boom occurred in the last few months, the stock had actually started to rise again as early as 2016, so much so that by the end of 2018 it had even exceeded $70.
So during the dot-com bubble, and in the years that followed, it had recorded a sensational +1,800%, before correcting a bit and resuming its upward path in 2016, when it marked another +680% in just two years.
At that point in less than 20 years, he had accumulated gains worth an incredible +13,000%.
Bitcoin is not 20 years old, but only 15, even though since it has been traded on exchanges the percentage of profit is even higher, and by far, than that of Nvidia from 1999 to 2018.
The second boom
The Nvidia stock price, however, did not stop at $73 in October 2018.
Actually in February 2020, shortly before the start of the pandemic, the price of its shares had returned above $70, after a brief correction, and with the financial markets crash in March 2020 it only dropped to $45, but only to start growing again from the following month.
This second boom continued until 2021, setting a new all-time high just a few weeks after Bitcoin’s.
In other words, between 2019 and 2021 it managed to climb to over $300, with another +370% after the +1,800% of the two thousand and ten years, and the +680% before the pandemic.
At that point, the retracement of 2022 began, which affected a bit all financial markets, including Bitcoin, so much so that in October of the same year the price of Nvidia shares had dropped below $110.
It was still a value much higher than the $79 in February 2020, but its run was not over yet.
NVIDIA Stocks: The third boom follows the price of Bitcoin
Indeed, in the course of 2023 the price of Nvidia shares has started to rise again.
After rising above $300 in May of last year, it then soared even further to a record high of over $960 in March 2024.
At that point, from the peak of 2021, it had recorded another sensational +181% in just over a year, bringing the gains since February 2020 to +1,100%.
In summary, after recording a first +1,800% from 1998 to 2016, it has strung together another series of strong gains, in increasingly shorter times: +680% in two years from 2016 to 2018, followed by another +370% in two years from 2019 to 2021, interspersed with the crash of March 2020 for the beginning of the pandemic, and finally another +181% in just over a year between 2023 and 2024.
The current price of about $824 is even 200,000% higher than the $0.4 in October 1999.
But if a +200,000% increase in 25 years may seem like a lot to someone, it is important to remember that Bitcoin has recorded a staggering +100,000,000% increase in the last 14 years.
However, the real difference is mainly made by the initial price of BTC, which was almost zero, because if we instead take as a reference the price it had at the end of 2012, at the time of the first halving and before the start of the first speculative bubble, the gain “reduces” to a still impressive +600,000%.
Although there are no major stock titles that can compete with Bitcoin in recent times in terms of percentage gain in the last 15 years, Nvidia among the top stock titles is probably the one that comes closest in absolute terms.
The timing of growth
The growth of Nvidia’s stock price in 1999 and 2000 was most likely largely due to the so-called dot-com bubble.
But since then the price of Nvidia shares has never returned to pre-bubble levels, it means that it was not just a speculative bubble.
Nvidia was one of the few stocks that did not collapse after the dot-com bubble burst, and what it did afterwards has clearly demonstrated that its increase in value was organic and justified.
Although in 2002 there was a strong retracement, from $6 to less than $1, already the following year the price of its shares had returned above $2, and in 2006 it had also returned above $5.
So it can be said that the first growth phase, characterized by very strong fluctuations also partly due to the bursting of the dot-com bubble, lasted for a good eight years, although marked by several ups and downs.
That phase was followed by practically nine years of sideways movement, characterized also by a downward excursion below $2.
Things have changed since 2016, when a three-phase growth cycle began that still seems to be ongoing. Since then, the overall gain acquired is 9,000%, in less than eight years.
This phase of growth, however, has not been uninterrupted, but divided into three phases.
The first one lasted until October 2018, and was followed by a not particularly dramatic retracement.
The second one started after the outbreak of the pandemic, and continued until the end of 2021.
The third one, started last year, could still be ongoing.
