News & Reviews:   US China Trade war

The long-running TikTok US saga could potentially come to a close soon, as the related parties get ready to meet. Officials from China and the US have allegedly reached a "framework agreement" to transfer TikTok's US operations to a US-controlled business or entity.

As you may know, the tariffs imposed by US President Donald Trump are expected to have wide-ranging consequences. But besides tariffs, companies face challenges in exporting goods too, especially to China. For Nvidia, a license is required to sell AI chips to China.

Earlier this week, US President Donald Trump announced new tariffs on imports from several countries including Malaysia (24%). This move would increase the prices of Malaysian goods in the US, which may result in less Americans buying them. While Malaysia has yet to respond, China has retaliated with a new tariff rate.

The hot news this week is definitely the inevitable TikTok ban. There have been calls for the US Supreme Court to postpone the ban, but the app will shut down soon if that doesn't pan out. Seeing the writing on the wall, American users have begun to find alternatives.

As the biggest chip manufacturer in the world, TSMC gets business from big brands like Samsung, Apple, and more. Most of these companies won't encounter issues with TSMC, except some based in China.

In an apparent U-Turn from US President Donald Trump’s earlier supposed intervention, the US administration has released an early publication of a rule that will ban all new contracts or buying of equipment from Huawei, ZTE and a number of other Chinese companies starting from 13 August 2019. The rule further states that these companies are still allowed to service previous infrastructure (the old US networks in various rural towns) as long as they provide full disclosure but only until August 2021, so it’s not a complete ban, but just one that benefits the US government (how surprising, lol).

Apparently, realizing that there’s just too many loose ends to shore up, the US Government has just provided Huawei with a temporary license for 3 months that invalidates the previous blacklist. The license in particular states that Huawei suppliers in the US may sell Huawei equipment "necessary to maintain and support existing and currently fully operational networks and equipment, including software updates and patches."