Microsoft (MSFT) has agreed to ship 60,000 Nvidia (NVDA) AI chips to the UAE as part of a deal approved by the U.S. Commerce Department. Shares in MSFT climbed a fraction of a percent on Monday, continuing its sporadic 19% rally since May 2025.
“We’re using these GPUs to provide access to advanced AI models from OpenAI, Anthropic, open-source providers, and Microsoft itself,” the Windows developer wrote in a company statement.
Microsoft’s announcement Monday was part of the company’s planned $15.2 billion investment in technology in the UAE, which it says has some of the highest per-capita usage of AI. The UAE ambassador to the U.S., Yousef Al Otaiba, said in a statement earlier this year that the arrangement was “setting a new ‘Gold Standard’ for securing AI models, chips, data and access.” The UAE’s ability to access chips is tied to its pledge to invest $1.4 trillion in U.S. energy and AI-related projects, an outsized sum given its annual GDP is roughly $540 billion.
Despite Microsoft (MSFT) posting better-than-expected Q3 earnings and revenue, shares in the stock still fell as much as 5% to end last week. The Nvidia chip deal with the UAE prompted investors to send the stock slightly higher to start this week, a big one for tech thanks to Tesla’s upcoming shareholder event.
Furthermore, Microsoft’s Nvidia decision also contrasts claims made by US President Donald Trump that no AI chips would be sent overseas. Asked by CBS News’ Norah O’Donnell on 60 Minutes if he will allow Nvidia to sell its most advanced chips to China, Trump said he wouldn’t. “We will let them deal with Nvidia but not in terms of the most advanced,” Trump said. “The most advanced, we will not let anybody have them other than the United States.”