NBIS Stock Rises 175% on NVIDIA Endorsement and Hedge Fund Stake

Nebius Group NASDAQ: NBIS it's up nearly 175% year to date, and the momentum shows no signs of slowing down. The AI ​​infrastructure company has gone from strength to strength in the past year.

The stock closed at $227.81 on Thursday, not far from its recent high of $278.84, and the stack behind its recent move is as compelling as anything in the neocloud industry right now. From the legendary NVIDIA NASDAQ: NVDA The confirmation of a multi-billion dollar hedge fund stake, the story and the sensation is accelerating in many places at once.

Jensen Huang Calls Nebius World-Class AI Cloud

One of the most interesting and important things in recent weeks comes from the most trusted voice in the world of AI infrastructure. On June 1, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang took the stage at the Computex technology trade show in Taipei, Taiwan, and publicly described Nebius as one of a select group of world-class AI clouds. “We recently worked with Nebius, and again, they're growing very fast,” Huang said, before a slide with both companies' logos appeared on the screen. He went on to highlight Nebius' list of impressive clients, including AI coding platform Cursor, geospatial intelligence leader World Labs, digital banking provider Revolut, and e-commerce giant Shopify. NASDAQ: SHOP.

Leopold Aschenbrenner's Status Awareness Takes a $3.3 Billion Stake

A few days before Huang's Computex comments, regulatory filings revealed that Situational Awareness LP acquired more than 12.4 million shares of Nebius, a portion representing about 5.6% of the company. Situational Awareness is led by Leopold Aschenbrenner, a former OpenAI researcher whose writing on AI safety and the long-term trajectory of AI has made him one of the most sought-after voices in the AI ​​investment community. The fund oversees a portfolio with a market value of $13.7 billion as of March 31.

The Basics Justify the Attention

Institutional and celebrity endorsements come after basic and rapid progress. Q1 2026 revenue grew 684% year over year, beating the consensus estimate. Management reiterated its 2026 ARR target of $7 billion to $9 billion and raised the power agreement's guidance to more than 4 gigawatts by the end of the year. Capital spending guidance has increased to $20 billion to $25 billion, reflecting the pace at which contracts and infrastructure are being implemented.

Contract backlog continues to support the revenue visibility issue. $27 billion multi-year deal with Meta Platforms NASDAQ: METAa $17.4 billion commitment from Microsoft NASDAQ: MSFTand the $2 billion investment from NVIDIA together represent $46 billion in dedicated and contracted revenue. For a company that was generating $120 million in annual revenue 18 months ago, that change is extremely difficult.

The company has also been deliberately increasing the value stack of AI. Three acquisitions have been completed so far this year: Tavily, Eigen AI for $643 million, and Clarifai, which targets the development of vision and agent search capabilities, deepening the platform's technology trench beyond raw GPU computing.

What Investors Should Watch

The consensus among 15 analysts is Average Buy, with a price target of $197. That implied bear market level based on guidance is not a bad thing, however. Instead, it paints a picture of the extraordinary momentum and inflows the stock has experienced in recent months.

For example, in the last 12 months, an institutional income of more than 5 billion dollars was recorded, compared to an outflow of almost 2 billion dollars. Similarly, online awareness has become the norm, whereas a year ago, there were few mentions of the company online. Another example of that is analyst coverage. Last year, only four analysts covered the stock. Now, 15 analysts cover the name.

With its next earnings not due until August 6, near-term price action will be driven by industry sentiment, additional contract announcements, and any additional institutional filings that emerge. The stock has a beta of more than 4, which means it moves with significant amplitudes in both directions, and investors considering entry at current levels should be aware of this volatility profile. But for those with a long-term view, the combination of accelerating institutional ownership, mainstream recognition, analyst reporting depth, and a contract backlog approaching $50 billion makes the underlying case hard to dismiss. The consensus target may remain below the current price, but the most important currency has clearly made up its mind.

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