Nvidia will sell more than 18,000 of its latest artificial intelligence chips to Saudi company Humain, CEO Jensen Huang announced Tuesday. The announcement was made as part of a White House-led trip to the region that includes President Donald Trump and other top CEOs.

Nvidia stock jumped over 3% early Wednesday after the company and fellow chipmakers announced billions of dollars worth of AI deals with Saudi Arabia.

Nvidia and other AI stocks climbed Wednesday, extending Tuesday's gains as Saudi partnerships stoked excitement for future deals.

The United States does not hold a monopoly on technological breakthroughs. As it sought to contain China’s advances in artificial intelligence, President Joe Biden’s administration tried to use restrictions on cutting-edge chips from Nvidia as a cudgel,

The announcements follow reports that the US administration intends to facilitate AI chip deals between American firms and Gulf nations.

“AI chips should not be bargaining chips for broader trade deals,” says Janet Egan, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). “They underpin US AI dominance, and we have to be really careful to not make short term decisions that might be beneficial for trade in the near term, but cede AI leadership in the longer term.”

President Donald Trump has continued to voice his desire for the U.S. to remain an AI leader while trying to keep top tech out of the hands of China.

The next front in the AI arms race isn’t Beijing. It’s in Riyadh, at least according to Wedbush. A sweeping new partnership between Nvidia and Saudi Arabia’s sovereign AI initiative, Humain, was the focus of the gathering.