Chipmaker Nvidia on Wednesday surpassed Apple's market capitalisation for the first time in history to become the world's second most valuable company after Microsoft.

In May, Nvidia posted an impressive $14 billion profit thanks to strong chip sales. Nvidia is experiencing unprecedented success in the semiconductor market thanks to its unique chips, which are essential for powering artificial intelligence products. Its major customers include Apple, Meta and Microsoft. The company's stock has more than doubled this year, rising more than 147% since January, when it was trading around $481 per share.

Mizuho Securities estimates that Nvidia controls 70 to 95% of the market for AI chips used in training and deploying models such as GPT OpenAI. Nvidia's strong market position is underscored by its 78% gross margin, an extremely high number for a hardware company involved in manufacturing and supplying physical products. In contrast, rival chipmakers Intel and Advanced Micro Devices had gross margins of 41% and 47%, respectively, in the latest quarter.