Trump-Xi Summit Leaves Nvidia’s China Chip Deal Stuck in Limbo: Report

NVIDIA chief executive Jensen Huang arrived in Beijing this week as a last-minute addition to President Donald Trump‘s delegation, raising expectations that one of the most closely watched technology deals in the world might finally move forward. However, that appears to not have been the case.

The New York Times reported that the fate of Nvidia’s powerful H200 artificial intelligence chips in China remained unresolved Friday after the trip ended without a breakthrough on the matter.

Trump and Xi met for more than two hours in Beijing on May 14, with discussions touching on Iran and Chinese investment in the United States. The White House said both sides agreed that the Strait of Hormuz “must remain open,” though China’s official readout did not mention it. Xi also reportedly told the CEOs accompanying Trump that “China’s door will only open wider and wider.”

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said semiconductor export controls were not a major focus of the talks, leaving the decision largely in Beijing’s hands. “The decision on whether to buy the H200 is going to be a sovereign decision for China,” Greer told Bloomberg.

“Obviously, we think it could be helpful to them in the long run, but they’ll just have to make their decision on that.” The impasse is significant because Trump approved Nvidia’s H200 for sale to China in December, reversing part of the broader U.S. effort to restrict Beijing’s access to advanced AI chips.

But no H200 chips have been delivered, even after U.S. officials cleared sales to roughly 10 Chinese companies, including Alibaba, Tencent, ByteDance, and JD.com. China, however, has shown little urgency to buy. Beijing has pushed its companies to use domestic technology from firms such as Huawei as part of a campaign to reduce dependence on U.S. hardware.

Huang has warned for months that U.S. export controls could backfire by accelerating China’s domestic chip ecosystem. “The day that DeepSeek comes out on Huawei first, that is a horrible outcome for our nation,” Huang said on a podcast this month, according to Reuters.

Trump acknowledged Friday that China had passed on the chips so far. “They chose not to, they want to try to develop their own,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One, according to the Times. Still, he left the door open, saying, “I think something could happen on that.”