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Nvidia reported revenue for its third fiscal quarter ended Oct. 30 amid a slowdown in PC and game sales and restrictions on what it can sell to China.
The Santa Clara, California-based company reported revenue for its third fiscal quarter of $5.93 billion, down 17% from a year ago and down 12% from the prior quarter.
GAAP earnings per diluted share for the quarter were 27 cents, down 72% from a year ago and up 4% from the prior quarter. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were 58 cents, down 50% from a year ago and up 14% from the prior quarter.
A downturn began in the previous quarter. Last quarter’s financial results for revenue met lower expectations, which were formulated after Nvidia warned that quarterly results would be weaker than expected.
The company’s game graphics and artificial intelligence (AI) chip business saw tremendous growth in 2020 and 2021 during the pandemic, but now things are slowing down in gaming. In after-hours trading, Nvidia shares are up 1.7% to $161.65 per share.
Analysts expected revenue of $5.77 billion (compared to $7.1 billion a year ago) and earnings per share came in at 69 cents on a GAAP basis.
For the data center, analysts expected $3.7 billion compared to $2.9 billion last year. And for gaming, they expected $1.3 billion versus $3.22 billion last year.
Actual revenue in the third quarter was $3.83 billion, up 31% from a year ago and up 1% from the prior quarter. Actual revenue for gaming in the third quarter was $1.57 billion, down 51% from a year ago and down 23% from the prior quarter.
Nvidia began to struggle this summer when it warned investors on Aug. 8 that the company would miss its own expectations for the quarter as game sales weakened. Nvidia saw weakness due to the war in Ukraine and a slowdown in China, with macroeconomic slowdowns around the world negatively impacting consumer demand.
The company said it cannot determine what impact declining demand for crypto mining had on lower revenues, but that may also have been a drag.
“We are quickly adapting to the macro environment, correcting inventory levels and paving the way for new products,” Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of Nvidia, said in a statement. “The emergence of our new platforms – Ada Lovelace RTX graphics, Hopper AI computing, BlueField and Quantum networks, Orin for autonomous vehicles and robotics, and Omniverse – is off to a good start and is the foundation of our next phase of growth.”
He added: “Nvidia’s pioneering work in accelerated computing is more important than ever. Constrained by physics, general purpose computing has become slower, just as AI requires more computing. With accelerated computing, companies can achieve huge productivity gains while saving money and the environment.”
Speaking to analysts, CFO Colette Kress said demand in China remained weak in FYQ3 and will continue in the current fiscal fourth quarter. Today, Nvidia and Microsoft announced that it will build an Azure-based supercomputer using tens of thousands of A100 chips.
Outlook
Nvidia’s outlook for the fourth fiscal quarter ended January 31 is as follows:
- Sales are expected to be $6.00 billion, plus or minus 2%.
- GAAP and non-GAAP gross margins are expected to be 63.2% and 66.0%, respectively, plus or minus 50 basis points.
- GAAP and non-GAAP operating expenses are expected to be approximately $2.56 billion and $1.78 billion, respectively.
- GAAP and non-GAAP other income and expenses are expected to be income of approximately $40 million, excluding gains and losses from unrelated investments.
- GAAP and non-GAAP tax rates are expected to be 9.0%, plus or minus 1%, excluding any individual items.
Data center revenue
Revenue in the third quarter was $3.83 billion, up 31% from a year ago and up 1% from the prior quarter.
Nvidia began shipping the H100 Tensor Core GPU based on the new Nvidia Hopper architecture in the quarter, with the first systems available now.
Gaming and visualization
Revenue in the third quarter was $1.57 billion, down 51% from a year ago and down 23% from the prior quarter.
In the quarter, Nvidia launched GeForce RTX 4090, the first GPU with Ada Lovelace architecture for gamers and creators, which quickly sold out in many locations. Sales of the RTX 4080 started today. Kress said Nvidia’s 4090 sold out quickly and the company is working hard to meet demand.
Professional visualization revenue in the third quarter was $200 million, down 65% from a year ago and down 60% from the prior quarter.
During the quarter, the company introduced Omniverse Cloud, the company’s first software and infrastructure-as-a-service offering, providing a comprehensive set of cloud services for artists, developers and enterprise teams to access metaverse applications.
Automotive and embedded
Third quarter automotive sales were $251 million, up 86% from a year ago and up 14% from the prior quarter.
During the quarter, Nvidia customers launched the all-electric Volvo EX90, powered by Nvidia Drive Orin and Xavier, and the Polestar 3, the brand’s first SUV, running on the Nvidia Drive platform.
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