> Nvidia does not have a captive finance company

You don’t need to when you have a few dozen customers. You meet with them and plot world dominance over cocktails.

Auto companies have the structure they do to support 1000s of dealerships and millions of customers.

Surely the credit risk level is completely different between individual customers personally on the hook vs speculative corporations?

Sure, but no matter the risk level the vendor always has the most ability to absorb defaults. It’s probably why they are the only reasonable lender in many markets