The US Department of Commerce on Sunday moved to close a year-old potential loophole it had created that may have led companies to export the world’s most advanced chips – such as Nvidia’s most sophisticated Rubin and Blackwell processors, as well as AMD’s MI350x – to Chinese entities located outside China. The unexpected guidance suggests the United States’ best artificial intelligence chips may have been making their way to the subsidiaries of Chinese AI firms based in places such as Malaysia...
Last year, China’s outward direct investment climbed 7 per cent to US$174 billion while overseas mergers and acquisitions rebounded to over US$43 billion, up nearly 40 per cent, according to EY data. Clearly, China’s appetite for global deal-making has returned. But the approach has changed. A decade ago, outbound investment was largely asset-driven, shaped by relatively light regulatory constraints and limited oversight. The prevailing mindset was simple: enter the market at all costs and fix...