A bullish assessment from Nvidia's Jensen Huang sent shares of China's top AI developers soaring on Wednesday. Huang, speaking a day earlier, declared the open-source AI agent OpenClaw "definitely the next ChatGPT," framing it as a fundamental shift in user capability.

The comment acted as a catalyst for China's so-called 'AI tigers.' MiniMax shares jumped 22% in Hong Kong, while rival Zhipu (Knowledge Atlas Technology) climbed 14%. Both firms have aggressively marketed agent-based AI tools and have recently launched products built on the OpenClaw framework. Zhipu also last month introduced GLM-5, an open-source model it claims rivals top Western models in coding tasks, though such benchmarks are difficult to verify independently.

The rally extended beyond pure-play AI firms. SenseTime, which has shifted focus from surveillance to AI platforms and linked an assistant to OpenClaw, saw a modest gain. Cloud provider UCloud Technology surged 13%.

Analysts note the surge underscores China's formidable role in global AI development. "China's rapid uptake of artificial intelligence reinforces its position as one of the world's leading AI markets," Moody's analysts observed recently. Yet integration is lopsided; large tech firms are driving deep adoption, while industrial and consumer sectors proceed more cautiously, primarily targeting efficiency gains.

The positive sentiment spilled into broader Asian tech. Shares of SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics also rose sharply after Huang projected trillion-dollar orders for Nvidia's upcoming Blackwell and Vera Rubin platforms through 2027.

Source: CNBC