Short seller flagged Huang’s ties to suspected spy in May

Six months before allegations about Nvidia ↗ 3.53% CEO Jensen Huang's relationship with a suspected Chinese intelligence asset upended the chipmaker, a small short-selling firm had already raised the issue. In May, Christian Lamarco of New York-based Culper Research published a 40-page report on Huang's ties to Alice Huang, who is not related to him and is a former television reporter and financial industry executive, CBS News reported Wednesday. Culper disclosed in the report that it was betting against Nvidia's stock.cbsnews.com

The report has drawn new attention now that Nvidia's board is investigating whether its CEO was "the target of a foreign intelligence effort." Huang admitted in a message to staff on November 8 that he had been unfaithful to his wife, Business Insider reported. Nvidia lost about $430 billion in market value over two trading sessions, according to Reuters Thomson Reuters Corporation ↗ 0.17%.reuters.com+1

What Culper Alleged

Lamarco built the report from interviews with employees of Chinese companies, Singaporean and Malaysian corporate filings, and social media posts that appeared to show the two Huangs socializing, CBS News reported. The report described an "uncomfortably close relationship" between Jensen Huang and Alice Huang, then a top executive at Singapore-based Megaspeed International. U.S. intelligence suspects her of being an asset of China's Ministry of State Security.cbsnews.com

Culper also alleged that more than 20% of Nvidia's fiscal 2026 compute revenue was still driven by China through illegal GPU diversion and Southeast Asian intermediaries. It said Megaspeed and its Malaysian affiliate Speedmatrix bought $4.8 billion of Nvidia equipment over three years, with financing from Alibaba ↘ 1.07%, according to CBS News. "We wrote about this in May," the firm posted on November 5.cbsnews.com

The Trader Behind the Bet

The Wall Street Journal News Corp ↗ 0.34% profiled Lamarco, 31, who named his firm after the Culper Ring, the spy network that tracked British troop movements for George Washington. He started it after a television program about the ring led him to see parallels with short-selling research. The Journal reported that for six months almost no one paid attention to the report, until this week. "Everyone was just mocking us, and now everyone is singing our praises," Lamarco told The New York Times ↗ 0.17%, according to CBS News.wsj.com+1

Widening Scrutiny

Nvidia's board has hired Joon Kim, a Wachtell Lipton partner and former acting U.S. attorney, to lead its probe. The board says it has no reason to believe national security or company secrets were compromised, Reuters reported. Separately, the Justice Department is investigating whether Megaspeed violated export controls, according to the Associated Press. Rep. Brian Mast told ABC News he would "absolutely" subpoena Huang if he did not respond by Wednesday to a request for a closed-door briefing. Beijing has called the spy allegation "nothing but smears."thenewsherald.com+2