Sell chips to China
Sell advanced AI chips to China. License sales of advanced chips like Nvidia's H200 to China.
What it does
The U.S. licenses sales of advanced Nvidia and AMD chips, such as the H200, to Chinese companies, with the government taking a share of revenue.
Applies to: Exports of advanced AI chips to China.
- License exports of H200-class chips to approved Chinese buyers, case by case.
- Cap China's shipments at 50% of U.S. shipments of the same chip; require U.S. testing and buyer security procedures.
- Government takes a share of revenue.
Where things stand
In January 2026 the Commerce Department moved H200 licenses to case-by-case review with a 50% cap. China's government initially blocked purchases; by August 2026, ByteDance and Tencent had each received about 10,000 H200s.
Why it costs ~6 weeks
It costs U.S. labs nothing directly, but it feeds Chinese labs more compute. The model prices relaxing all chip controls at about four weeks; licensing these chips alone is about two weeks.
Biggest unknown: How many chips China actually buys. Deliveries so far are a small fraction of what is licensed.
Its effect on p(doom)
Not a safety law. It lets U.S. chipmakers sell advanced chips to China.
It speeds China's labs. The effect on risk is debated.
The strongest case that it costs more
If China buys up to the cap, the compute gap could shrink from dozens of times to nearly even within a year, and the lead would erode faster than any safety rule on the menu could cost.
The debate
For
- Jensen Huang, Nvidia called export controls a failure, 2025.
- David Sacks framed sales as selling lagging chips to take market share from Huawei, 2025.
- Howard Lutnick, Commerce Secretary defended the licensing policy to the Senate, 2026.
Against
Sources
- BIS revises license review policy for chips to China (Jan 13, 2026)
- Institute for Progress, Should the US sell Hopper chips to China? (Dec 2025)
- IAPS, Assessing outcomes of H200 exports to China (Mar 2026): more than 250% increase at the cap
- CNAS, Unpacking the H200 export policy (Jan 2026)
- Engadget, China allows ByteDance and Tencent to import 10,000 H200s (Aug 2026)
Rough starting points, not precise forecasts. Lead costs assume China doesn't depend on U.S. models, the case least favorable to safety laws, and count 3 years. On the menu you can change every assumption and put in your own numbers. Last priced 2026-09-26.