Nvidia ‘s headstart in AI chipmaking could boost its shares another 30%, according to Bank of America. “Despite claims by rivals (AMD, Intel, custom chips or ASICs) we see NVDA with a multi-year lead in performance, pipeline (Blackwell, successors), incumbency, scale and developer support (5mn+),” wrote analyst Vivek Arya in a Wednesday note. Nvidia shares have already risen 29% just since the end of March, pushing its year-to-date gain to 135%. The stock more than tripled in 2023, climbing 239%. Bank of America’s Arya reaffirmed his buy rating on shares and $1,500 price target, implying 29% upside from Tuesday’s close. He views Nvidia as best positioned “to enabling the $3 trillion IT industry towards delivering AI services.” The analyst also cited Nvidia’s strong pipeline of products, solid demand and “strong visibility” into demand for the latest Blackwell graphics processing unit and Grace central processing units in the race to implement AI. NVDA YTD mountain Shares this year While Nvidia’s surging share price, giving the Jensen Huang-led company a market value approaching $2.9 trillion, may create volatility, Arya noted that the stock still trades below its median 33x price-to-earnings ratio. Nvidia also sells at a lower valuation than it did when the AI-powered ChatGPT chatbot was introduced in November 2022, and price-to-earnings growth (PEG) ratio less than 1.0, Bank of America said.