Judul : Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang charms China – but trade war fears still lurk beneath surface
link : Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang charms China – but trade war fears still lurk beneath surface
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang charms China – but trade war fears still lurk beneath surface
On his third trip to China in a year, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang - head of the world's most valuable company - was on a full-blown charm offensive.
As a guest of honour at the China International Supply Chain Expo, Huang's visit underscored the recent thaw in Sino-US relations. Upon arrival, he announced Washington had cleared the way for Nvidia to export the H20 - a made-for-China AI chip less powerful than its gold-standard acceleration model, which was banned for export to the country in April.
At the opening ceremony for the expo's third edition, Huang even swapped his signature leather jacket for a traditional Chinese tang suit, delivering part of his speech in rusty Mandarin. Offstage, he took endless media interviews, praised Chinese technology companies and AI models and posed for selfie requests, all with great patience.
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His charisma and optimism were on display after China and the US agreed on a framework in trade negotiations and pushed ahead with approvals for certain technology and rare earth exports.
Led by Nvidia, US firms were the largest overseas contingent at the expo - with participation up 15 per cent compared to the previous edition.
But beneath the surface of the buoyant atmosphere, the threat of supply chain disruptions - and a broader decoupling - had not dissipated.
The dark cloud of tariffs loomed over traders. At the US Grains Council booth, I met a Chinese importer who sources rice bran from America. Like most other US products under the 90-day trade truce, the grain faces a 10 per cent levy upon entering China. The importer and his US supplier have agreed to share the costs.
"These tariff wars are bleeding us dry - we could have made 2 million yuan a year, but now we may lose 2 million annually," the importer said on condition of anonymity.
A by-product of the rice milling industry, rice bran is widely used as hog feed. China, as the world's leading producer and consumer of pork, imports substantial amounts annually, with the US one of its top suppliers.
When tariffs soared to over 100 per cent in April, two of the importer's shipments were diverted to Vietnam - resulting in significant losses.
"The re-routing incurred additional costs of US$600 per ton, while our normal profit margin for rice is only US$100 per ton," he said.
Despite recent progress in US-China trade talks, he remains cautious about placing large-volume orders or committing to major contracts.
"Our downstream clients have requested a shipment hold for weeks, awaiting policy clarification after the 90-day tariff war truce," he said. "We are afraid of another sudden escalation of tariffs."
A representative from a US state office in China expressed similar concerns.
Many such offices, which promote trade and investment opportunities, have decided to withdraw from China since last year - most of them Republican-led or swing states. Today, only about 10 Democrat-led states maintain a presence, down from about 20 offices previously, according to the representative.
There was a surge in interest from Chinese firms to build warehouses or factories in America during the second half of last year, she said - especially when the possibility of US President Donald Trump returning to the White House became clearer. But following Washington's unprecedented trade war, launched in April, consultation requests declined sharply.
One of her clients - a Chinese manufacturer in the raw materials industry - recently decided to cancel plans to build warehouses in her state.
"The plan was to quickly stock some goods in the US as a contingency against potential trade barriers. But after they selected a place, the approval process became a bottleneck - the property agents required extensive documentation because the company is Chinese - and nothing was completed when the tariff war began. Then the plan became pointless."
After the US-China trade talks in Geneva in May, most tariffs were removed or suspended for 90 days - but the company's anxiety was not at all alleviated, she said.
"Their management began questioning the entire US investment strategy. Consequently, the warehouse initiative has been shelved indefinitely."
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This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (www.scmp.com), the leading news media reporting on China and Asia.
Copyright (c) 2025. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
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