Huang’s Nvidia exit clouds Trump-Xi talks at APEC

The scandal around Jensen Huang has become a new unknown in next week's meeting between President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping. The two leaders are expected to meet on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Shenzhen on Nov. 18-19, and a fragile trade truce runs only until Jan. 10. Nvidia announced Thursday that Huang will step down as chief executive. US officials suspect that Alice Huang, a former Megaspeed executive with whom he had a relationship, worked for Chinese intelligence.aljazeera.com+1

The main agenda items are US controls on advanced chip exports and China's easing of rare-earth export curbs. The affair has complicated both sides' calculations, and Congress is opening a bipartisan inquiry.chosun.com

Pressure on export controls

Renewing the truce depends largely on the US holding off on new restrictions on tech shipments to China, Bloomberg reported. "This is the first major test of the truce," said Jeff Moon, a former assistant US trade representative. He noted that the deal rested on US promises not to add tech curbs in exchange for Chinese critical minerals. Lawmakers now want chip-control measures added to this year's defense bill. Three Republican House committee chairs have asked Huang to attend a closed-door briefing on Nov. 18, the day the summit opens.cnbc.com+2

Michael Deng, a Bloomberg analyst and former Commerce Department official, told Semafor that Beijing "is going to know that Trump may not necessarily be able to hold any commitments he makes." He pointed to Democrats taking control of Congress in January.semafor.com

Leverage questions

Dexter Tiff Roberts of the Atlantic Council told CNA that Trump is now "a weaker partner." Drew Thompson of RSIS disagreed and argued that Congress has few ways to limit how a president negotiates. Trump has said he doesn't expect to raise the affair with Xi, and he has called Huang an "honourable guy."channelnewsasia.com+1

Rare earths remain a sore point. US officials have complained that the minerals are not arriving at the expected volume and pace. Analysts warn that if Washington tightens tech controls, China could retaliate by restricting rare-earth supplies. Chinese AI stocks, including Alibaba ↘ 7.05%, fell Thursday on worries that their access to advanced chips could suffer.moneyweb.co.za+1

Beijing's response

On Thursday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said the US should "stop fabricating such 'spy' narratives as a pretext for imposing a technological blockade." She also said Beijing is willing to carry out the leaders' earlier consensus. On Monday, China's Customs Tariff Commission kept an extra 24% tariff on US goods suspended for two more months.aljazeera.com+1

Most analysts still expect the truce to survive. "When Trump and Xi meet next week in Shenzhen they will probably agree to keep the uneasy U.S.-China truce going," Gavekal Dragonomics' Arthur Kroeber told CNBC. "It will just keep getting more and more uneasy."cnbc.com