Nvidia stock was falling on Thursday ahead of earnings from one of its big rivals, which could shed light on strength of demand for artificial intelligence chips.

Shares fell 0.46% to $141.27 in early trading. Futures tracking the benchmark S&P 500 were up 0.1%.

Fellow chip maker Broadcom is set to post its earnings for its second fiscal quarter after Thursday's closing bell.

Analysts are expecting Broadcom to report earnings of $1.57 a share on revenue of $14.96 billion, according to a FactSet poll. A year ago, the chip maker reported earnings of $1.10 a share on revenue of $12.49 billion.

Broadcom has generally emphasized that its chips aren't directly competing in every AI market with Nvidia's graphics-processing units, which have a much wider customer base, although the two companies do compete with one another to provide advanced networking infrastructure for AI data centers.

Both stocks could benefit if the results show the overall size of the AI chip market is growing. So far this year the signs have been positive.

"New entrants to the AI market are now spending at a faster pace, with capex likely rising over 80% this year and another 50% in 2026," wrote Mark Haefele, chief investment officer at UBS Global Wealth Management, in a research note on Thursday.

"While chip-related controls amid intensifying US-China tech rivalry could weigh on investor sentiment in the near term, markets are likely to return to fundamentals, which remain supportive," he added.

Nvidia doesn't only make semiconductors for AI programs. On Tuesday, CEO Jensen Huang appeared on a special edition of the Nintendo Creator's Voice YouTube series, where he talked up the custom processors that feature in the Japanese company's Switch 2 console, which released in most regions on Thursday.

Broadcom shares rose 0.9% ahead of Thursday's earnings report. Among other chip makers, Advanced Micro Devices climbed 0.6%, Intel gained 0.5%, and Qualcomm traded flat.