The US imposed a 25 percent tariff on imports of certain advanced semiconductors, a key step in an agreement approved by the Trump administration allowing Nvidia to ship H200 artificial intelligence (AI) processors to China, Bloomberg reported on Thursday. Chinese experts said that the move reflects Washington’s attempt to extract profits, and they warned that it distorts market rules, disrupts global semiconductor supply chains and risks backfiring on US industries.
Under an order that US President Donald Trump signed on Wednesday, the government would collect the duty on the chips as they are brought to the US before final shipment to Chinese customers and other foreign markets, Bloomberg reported.
The 25 percent tariff applies to “a very narrow category of semiconductors that are an important element of my administration’s AI and technology policies,” the proclamation said. That includes the H200 and Advanced Micro Devices Inc’s MI325X, according to the fact sheet, Bloomberg reported. There is an exception for those chips that are “imported to support the buildout of the US technology supply chain.”
Trump directed Commerce Secretary and US Trade Representative to “pursue negotiation of agreements” on imports and to report back in 90 days, according to the proclamation he signed. Trump may announce new tariffs and an accompanying offset program to incentivize domestic manufacturing “in the near future,” a White House fact sheet said, Bloomberg reported.
Zhou Mi, a senior researcher at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, told the Global Times that the US move to impose additional import tariffs under the pretext of protecting domestic industry is effectively driving a wedge into global semiconductor trade cooperation, sharply pushing up costs and disrupting the existing order. This not only undermines US companies’ participation in the globalized semiconductor industry, but will also force supply chains to adjust, ultimately backfiring on the US itself.
“Though the overall impact on the global semiconductor industry remains to be seen, it’s certain that it would be hard for Washington to bring chip manufacturing back to the US by imposing tariffs in the short term because of high costs in the US and the highly global labor division of the industry,” Bao Jianyun, dean and professor of the Department of International Politics at the School of International Studies at Renmin University of China, told the Global Times on Thursday.
Previously, the US government allowed Nvidia’s H200 processors, widely regarded as its second-most advanced AI chips, to be exported to China on the condition that Washington received a 25 percent cut,
Previously, Reuters reported in early December that the US would allow Nvidia’s H200 processors, widely regarded as its second-most advanced AI chips, to be exported to China on the condition that Washington receives a 25 percent cut.
In response to a question regarding claims by Trump on Wednesday that his administration will approve sales to China of Nvidia’s H200 chip for artificial intelligence and the US government will take 25 percent of sales, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said on Thursday that on US chips export to China and the tariffs issue, China has made clear its position more than once.
Ma Jihua, a veteran industry insider, told the Global Times that the US is extracting profits from exports of advanced chips while also imposing tariffs on imported semiconductors, effectively seeking gains on both sides of trade. From an international perspective, such measures serve to curb China’s chip industry and technological progress, disregard the semiconductor sector’s global division of labor, disrupt supply chains and risk slowing AI development.
Ma said that tariffs on advanced chip imports are effectively one of Washington’s tools to force semiconductor manufacturing back to the US, but in practice they raise procurement costs for downstream customers and interfere with supply chains. The Trump administration’s attempt to use tariffs to push manufacturing onshore runs counter to the fundamental laws of global semiconductor development and has failed to deliver quick results in other sectors. Instead, such heavy-handed measures disregard market principles and inflict significant damage on the industry’s healthy and sustainable growth.
Wei Shaojun, vice chairman of the China Semiconductor Industry Association, told the Global Times in an exclusive interview that the US intention to weaponize tariffs to curb the development of specific countries’ industries runs counter to the WTO’s principles of free trade and undermines global technological innovation.
Wei noted that the semiconductor supply chain spans dozens of countries and regions, and any irrational shock to a single link could trigger cascading effects. He stressed opposition to turning normal economic and trade ties into bargaining chips, calling instead for resolving differences through dialogue and consultation, and urging relevant countries to pursue win-win outcomes rather than zero-sum calculations.
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