Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick Faces Fresh Scrutiny Over Financial Ties to Nvidia

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is facing renewed scrutiny regarding financial ties between the chipmaker Nvidia and his family's Wall Street firm, Cantor Fitzgerald.

Financial Ties and Share Changes

Cantor Fitzgerald hosted Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and other executives for investor meetings in New York in late September. Analyst C.J. Muse maintained an overweight rating and a $350 price target on the stock. Before Howard Lutnick left Wall Street to become commerce secretary in February 2025, Nvidia was the firm's second-largest reported stock position. At the end of 2024, the firm held over 3.5 million Nvidia shares worth $479 million. That share count held steady through September 2025 and its value climbed 36 percent to $652 million. Over the following six months, the number of Nvidia shares Cantor reported holding fell by 49 percent to 3 million in December and 1.78 million by the end of March 2026. Their value dropped from $652 million to $310 million. Most of those shares were attributed to CF Secured, a Cantor brokerage subsidiary that uses stocks and derivatives to hedge customer transactions. Cantor also disclosed substantial Nvidia options positions skewed toward put options during the examined period. The firm's reported holdings remained near that lower level through June 30 at 1.81 million shares. Cantor has not publicly explained the decline in shares.

Regulatory Pressure and Investigations

The drop in shares coincided with White House and U.S. intelligence officials pressing Lutnick to crack down on Megaspeed, a Singapore-based company suspected of funneling advanced artificial intelligence chips to China. Lutnick reportedly resisted those efforts. By the time Cantor hosted Huang, Lutnick had received a classified intelligence warning about Huang's ties to a suspected Chinese spy. He had also appeared alongside Huang at a G20 technology summit in North Carolina. These events follow Jensen Huang's resignation as Nvidia CEO. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated that the Treasury, Defense, and State departments and the U.S. Trade Representative were in favor of putting Megaspeed on the entity list for months, pointing to the Commerce Department regarding internal processes. President Donald Trump maintains complete confidence in the commerce secretary. Meanwhile, lawmakers including Sens. Jim Banks and Elizabeth Warren urged Lutnick in March to suspend or reconsider Nvidia export licenses after three people linked to customer Super Micro Computer were indicted on charges of conspiring to smuggle AI chips to China.

Ethics and Business Dealings

While continuing to pare back its stake, Cantor has helped arrange billions of dollars in financing for Nvidia's business partners. On May 7, Nvidia and Australia-based cloud provider IREN announced a five-year, $3.4 billion cloud computing contract alongside a strategic partnership allowing Nvidia to invest up to $2.1 billion. IREN co-CEO Daniel Roberts noted Nvidia is a partner that wins as they deliver. Richard Painter, former chief White House ethics lawyer and current University of Minnesota law professor, stated there is no proof Lutnick shared nonpublic information with Cantor Fitzgerald, but added that the appearance does not look great. There is no evidence that Lutnick's sons, Brandon and Kyle, who now lead the firm, had advance knowledge of intelligence concerns, that holdings changes were tied to warnings, or that business interests influenced their father's decisions. Brandon Lutnick recently praised Nvidia on Fox Business as one of the great companies on the planet with an amazing leadership team.

Context

Cabinet officials in the United States are subject to strict conflict-of-interest rules regarding their prior financial holdings and family business ties. Intelligence warnings and export controls on advanced semiconductors involve national security considerations around technology transfers to foreign adversaries.