NVIDIA's $68B Quarter: When Compute Equals Revenue and GPUs Print Money
Jensen Huang has never been subtle. But on February 25, 2026, he distilled the entire AI economy into five words: "Compute equals revenues." NVIDIA just reported $68.1 billion in quarterly revenue — up 73% year-over-year — closing a fiscal year that generated $216 billion in total sales and $120 billion in net income. Those aren't semiconductor numbers. Those are sovereign-GDP-level cash flows, and they're accelerating.
The Numbers That Matter
| Metric | Q4 FY2026 | Full Year FY2026 | YoY Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $68,127M | $215,938M | +73% / +65% |
| Gross Margin | 75.0% | 71.1% | Recovery |
| Operating Income | $44,299M | $130,387M | +73% / +60% |
| Net Income | $42,960M | $120,067M | +78% / +65% |
| Free Cash Flow | ~$35B | $96,575M | — |
NVIDIA earned $43 billion in a single quarter. To put that in perspective, that exceeds the annual net income of every company in the S&P 500 except Apple and Microsoft.
"Compute Is Revenue" — Jensen's New Mantra
The earnings call was philosophically loaded. Huang's core thesis: in the age of agentic AI, every token generated is a monetizable unit of work.
"Without compute, there is no way to generate tokens. Without tokens, there is no way to grow revenues. So in this new world of AI, compute equals revenues."
He called this the "ChatGPT moment of agentic AI", pointing to the explosion of Claude Cowork and OpenAI Codex as evidence that inference demand has gone "exponential." Agentic systems spawning sub-agents, each consuming tokens, each generating revenue for the infrastructure providers. NVIDIA doesn't sell chips — it sells the printing press for a new currency.
Revenue by Segment: The Full FY2026 Picture
Every dollar tracked through double-entry accounting in Beancount:
| Segment | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 | Q4 | FY2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Data Center | $39,112M | $41,096M | $51,215M | $62,314M | $193,737M |
| Gaming | $3,763M | $4,287M | $4,265M | $3,727M | $16,042M |
| Pro Visualization | $509M | $601M | $760M | $1,321M | $3,191M |
| Automotive | $567M | $586M | $592M | $604M | $2,349M |
| OEM & Other | $111M | $173M | $174M | $161M | $619M |
| Total | $44,062M | $46,743M | $57,006M | $68,127M | $215,938M |
Three stories jump out of this table.
Data Center ($62.3B, +75% YoY): Now 91.5% of revenue. Nearly 9 gigawatts of Blackwell infrastructure deployed globally, with Grace Blackwell GB200 NVL72 achieving 50x performance per watt versus prior generation. Hyperscalers remain just above 50% of the mix — the rest comes from sovereign AI programs (exceeding $30B in FY2026, tripling YoY), enterprises, and AI-native startups. Networking revenue alone hit $11B in Q4, up 263% YoY.
Professional Visualization ($1.3B, +159% YoY): The sleeper story. This segment crossed $1B for the first time, driven by RTX PRO Blackwell workstations with 72GB memory. Enterprise buyers running local AI inference — not cloud, local — are the primary demand driver. This is the edge AI thesis materializing in real purchasing decisions.
Gaming ($3.7B, -13% QoQ): NVIDIA is quietly deprioritizing gamers. CFO Colette Kress confirmed supply constraints will remain "a headwind in Q1 FY2027 and beyond." The culprit: DRAM shortages, with memory allocation redirected to higher-margin Data Center products. Reports suggest RTX 50-series production cuts of 30-40%. Gaming is now just 5.5% of revenue.
The $20 Billion Groq Acquisition: Hidden in Goodwill
The balance sheet tells a story the income statement can't. Goodwill surged from $5.2B to $20.8B — a $15.6B increase driven primarily by NVIDIA's $20 billion acquisition of Groq, the AI inference chip startup. It was structured as an asset purchase, acquiring Groq's Language Processing Unit technology and key talent including CEO Jonathan Ross.
This is the largest deal in NVIDIA's history, and it barely registered in the earnings narrative.
NVIDIA the Venture Capitalist: $22B in AI Bets
Perhaps the most fascinating line on the balance sheet: $22.3 billion in non-marketable equity securities — NVIDIA's portfolio of strategic investments in AI companies. The company invested $17.5 billion in private companies during FY2026 alone, turning its balance sheet into one of the world's largest AI venture funds.
This portfolio generated $5.6B in "Other Income" in Q4 — mostly unrealized gains including a reported $5B stake in Intel. It's also what created the $0.14 gap between GAAP EPS ($1.76) and non-GAAP EPS ($1.62). Expect this line to be volatile going forward.
The Margin Recovery Story
| Quarter | Gross Margin | Key Factor |
|---|---|---|
| Q1 FY2026 | ~60% | $4.5B H20 inventory charge |
| Q2 FY2026 | ~72% | Recovery |
| Q3 FY2026 | 73.4% | Blackwell ramp |
| Q4 FY2026 | 75.0% | Full Blackwell economics |
The Q1 H20 charge — triggered by U.S. export controls on China-destined chips — depressed full-year margin to 71.1%. But the quarterly trajectory tells the real story: NVIDIA recovered to 75% by Q4, and guidance holds there for Q1 FY2027. China Data Center compute revenue is now assumed to be zero.
$78 Billion Q1 Guidance: The Acceleration Continues
NVIDIA guided Q1 FY2027 to $78.0B +/- 2%, crushing the $72.6B consensus by 7.4%. At this scale, sequential growth of 14.5% implies annualized revenue approaching $312B. And this guidance excludes any China revenue.
Supply commitments nearly doubled to $95.2B sequentially, signaling confidence in sustained demand through the Rubin architecture transition in H2 2027.
Tracking $216B in Plain Text
We model the complete NVIDIA financial history — FY2024 through FY2026 — as double-entry transactions in Beancount. Here's what Q4 FY2026 looks like:
2026-01-25 * "Q4 FY2026 Revenue" "Data Center"
Assets:Current:Accounts-Receivable 62,314,000,000.00 USD
Income:Data-Center -62,314,000,000.00 USD
2026-01-25 * "Q4 FY2026 Expenses" "Cost of revenue"
Expenses:Cost-Of-Revenue 17,034,000,000.00 USD
Assets:Current:Cash-And-Equivalents -17,034,000,000.00 USD
2026-01-25 * "Q4 FY2026 Income" "Other, net (equity investment gains)"
Assets:Current:Cash-And-Equivalents 5,604,000,000.00 USD
Income:Other-Income-Expense -5,604,000,000.00 USD
Every segment, every cost line, every balance sheet adjustment — modeled as transactions that balance to the penny across three fiscal years. Explore the full ledger:
The Bottom Line
NVIDIA closed FY2026 with $216B in revenue, $120B in net income, and $97B in free cash flow. It returned $41B to shareholders while investing $17.5B in the AI ecosystem. It acquired Groq for $20B. And it guided to an acceleration.
Jensen's "compute equals revenue" isn't just a soundbite — it's the accounting identity of the AI era. Every hyperscaler, every sovereign government, every enterprise deploying agents is converting GPU cycles into economic output. NVIDIA owns the conversion layer.
The question is no longer whether NVIDIA can sustain this. It's whether the rest of the economy can absorb compute fast enough.
