Nvidia stock retains the crown as 'retail king' despite lagging in 2026

Retail investors are sticking with a banal that has printed them wealth implicit the past respective years, contempt a lukewarm commencement to the year.

That banal is nary different than AI spot darling Nvidia (NVDA).

Nvidia has seen $706 cardinal successful nett retail inflows implicit the past 5 days, according to caller information from Vanda Research. The inflows suggest retail investors proceed to presumption Nvidia arsenic a halfway holding successful their portfolio.

"Nvidia remains the undisputed retail king," Vanda Research opined.

Shares of the "Magnificent Seven" subordinate are down 1.7% twelvemonth to date, lagging the flimsy summation for the benchmark S&P 500 (^GSPC). The lone 2 Magnificent Seven components that are higher successful 2026 are Alphabet (GOOGL) and Amazon (AMZN), with gains of 7% and 2.55%, respectively.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had a well-received showing for his World Economic Forum debut connected Wednesday.

Huang — sporting his trademark achromatic leather overgarment — said he's seeing a "boom" successful commercialized jobs and six-figure salaries for those helping to physique retired AI infrastructure.

"Everyone should beryllium capable to marque a large living," Huang said. He added that helium expects the existent question of AI volition pb to the "largest infrastructure build-out successful quality history" involving trillions of dollars.

He besides pushed back, again, connected the conception of determination being an AI bubble. He said the lone crushed AI bubble fears travel astir is due to the fact that the investments are truthful large, but the accidental is “really rather extraordinary.” Nvidia's banal finished the time adjacent the highs of the session, up 2.95%.

The adjacent catalyst for Nvidia and its retail fans: quarterly net connected Feb. 25.

Citi expert Atif Malik is bullish connected Nvidia into the report.

"Fundamentally, compute and networking request for adjacent procreation reasoning models is accelerating and volition apt thrust upside for some Broadcom and Nvidia which we spot arsenic halfway AI holdings. Nvidia astatine CES talked astir upside to information halfway request and Taiwan Semiconductor bumped up its 2026 sales/capex maturation past week," Malik said.