US Not Easing Chip Export Controls to Get China’s Critical Minerals, Bessent Says
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent denied June 11 that the Trump administration has agreed to relax controls on chip exports to China in return for China curbing its own restrictions on rare earth exports.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.
“There is no quid pro quo in terms of chips for rare earths,” Bessent told the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government in response to questioning by Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., who cited a news report suggesting the U.S. was eyeing such an arrangement.
Asked by Van Hollen whether there are any plans to increase China’s access to advanced chip technology, Bessent replied that the administration has “done just the opposite. We put export controls on the Nvidia H20, which I would regard as a very upper-end chip but not the highest-end chip.” Nvidia revealed in April that it was told by the U.S. government to begin obtaining licenses to export H20s to China (see 2504160026).
Bessent’s comments came the same day President Donald Trump said that a new U.S.-China deal calls for Beijing to rein in export controls on critical minerals. Trump didn’t indicate whether the agreement also reduces recent U.S. export restrictions on chips (see 2506110044). A senior administration official said two days earlier that the U.S. was willing to lift export controls on certain chips in exchange for China approving exports of rare earths and other critical minerals (see 2506090033).