Amid Shortage, Nvidia Suggests Limit on Graphics Card Orders

Knowing how to find new equilibrium prices and quantities from changes in supply and demand is key to understanding the basics of microeconomics. It is equally important to understand what goes on in markets as they are adjusting, sometimes very slowly, to a new equilibrium.

The hype and potential lucrative endeavor of mining Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies drastically increased the demand for computer graphic processing units (GPUs) leading to a severe shortage in this market. Although mining bitcoin using GPUs began around 2011-2012, the huge spike in demand became clear around 2016 when the price of Bitcoin started to skyrocket.

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1. How does GPU companies (Nvidia and AMD) respond to this increase in demand over time?
2. How do the stock prices of these two companies today compare to what they were at the beginning of 2016? Cite your sources.
3. as the CEO of either of these companies (or, more realistically, a shareholder and investor) how would you think about the long-term demand of the GPU market? Are cryptocurrencies just a hype?