Key points
- Colette Kress has been Nvidia's CFO since 2013 and is now its interim CEO
- Nvidia reported $14.3 million in fiscal 2026 pay for Kress
- Kress reported about 4.8 million Nvidia shares, including indirect holdings
Colette Kress became interim chief executive of Nvidia (NVDA) after Jensen Huang resigned as CEO and left the board, the company announced on Nov. 12. She has been Nvidia's chief financial officer since 2013 and will keep that job while the board searches for a permanent CEO, according to the press release.
Kress is 59. The board will consider internal and external candidates for the permanent role, and the release gives no timeline for the search.
Where did Colette Kress work before Nvidia?
Before Nvidia, Kress spent nearly 25 years in finance roles at technology companies, according to the release. The executive biography in Nvidia's most recent annual report lists eight years in finance positions at chipmaker Texas Instruments before she joined Microsoft.
She worked at Microsoft from 1997 to 2010. Starting in 2006, she was chief financial officer of its Server and Tools division. She then moved to Cisco in 2010 as senior vice president and CFO of its Business Technology and Operations Finance organization, and joined Nvidia as executive vice president and CFO in 2013.
Kress has a bachelor's degree in finance from the University of Arizona and an MBA from Southern Methodist University.
How much does Nvidia pay Colette Kress?
Nvidia reported total compensation of $14.3 million for Kress in fiscal 2026, which ended on Jan. 25, 2026, according to its 2026 proxy statement. About $12.8 million of that total was the grant-date value of stock awards, which vest over time. It isn't necessarily the amount she will ultimately receive from them. Her base salary target was $900,000.
The same table shows total compensation of $13.3 million for Kress in fiscal 2024 and $21.4 million in fiscal 2025.
Huang's total compensation for fiscal 2026 was $36.3 million. The proxy says Nvidia's executive officers are "at-will" employees and that the company has no employment, severance, or change-in-control agreements with them. The Nov. 12 filing doesn't describe any change to Kress's pay for the interim role.
How much Nvidia stock does Colette Kress own?
Kress reported holding about 4.78 million Nvidia shares, directly or indirectly, after a sale on Sept. 17, according to her latest Form 4. That total combines 765,103 shares she holds directly with about 4.01 million held through trusts, a limited liability company, and family members.
At the Nov. 11 close of $173.73, those shares were worth about $830 million. The proxy put her stake at less than 1% of Nvidia's shares.
How much Nvidia stock has Colette Kress sold?
Kress has reported selling about 1.03 million Nvidia shares since the start of 2024, including sales from trusts. We added up the sales in the 16 Form 4 filings that reported them, which are listed on her SEC filing page. We multiplied the shares in each reported sale by its weighted average price, and the sales came to about $158 million before taxes and fees. The total doesn't include shares withheld to cover taxes when stock awards vested, or shares she gave as gifts.
The sales ran from June 21, 2024, to Sept. 17, 2026. They came to about $53.9 million in 2024, $68.2 million in 2025, and $35.8 million so far in 2026. Some of the shares were sold from trusts rather than from her direct holdings, and each of the 16 filings cites a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan.
On Sept. 17, Kress sold 34,918 shares at weighted average prices between $218.01 and $219.59. The sales were made under a Rule 10b5-1 plan she adopted on June 16, 2026. A 10b5-1 plan sets the terms of future trades in advance, so the timing isn't chosen trade by trade.
What did Colette Kress say about her new role?
"NVIDIA's strength has always come from its people, and together with our leadership team, I am committed to building on the extraordinary foundation Jensen created over the last 33 years," Kress said in the release.
Board chair Harvey C. Jones said Kress "has helped lead NVIDIA through a period of extraordinary growth and has a deep understanding of our business, customers, operations and financial position."
Nvidia reports fiscal third-quarter results on Nov. 17, five days after the announcement. Its Oct. 28 notice for the earnings call says Nvidia will post written commentary on the results from Kress before the call. Neither that notice nor the Nov. 12 release says who will speak on the call. We're tracking the rest of the story on our Jensen Huang scandal timeline.
Cover photo: SiliconANGLE theCUBE, 2017, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0.
