Nvidia pauses some AI financing deals amid antitrust worries

Nvidia's pause of some financing deals comes right after a blockbuster earnings report. The company reported $96.2 billion quarterly revenue and projected 70% growth for the next fiscal year, so the pause is not about weak demand. Instead, it addresses internal worries about antitrust scrutiny and the control Nvidia sought over how participating cloud companies distributed capacity. This suggests Nvidia is being cautious about its aggressive financing model, which included selling GPUs, supporting financing, and sharing in cloud revenue. The pause reduces one source of concern about the blurry line between selling into independent demand and helping create demand. Investors are watching whether Nvidia can balance expanding compute access without becoming too central as financier, backstop, and supplier. Short interest data from August 14 showed about 1.2% of float was short, indicating some lingering skepticism despite strong fundamentals.