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An official from U.S. Commerce verified at a House hearing that the agency has not yet authorized any transactions involving the Nvidia H200 for China. According to Bloomberg, Assistant Secretary for export enforcement David Peters was telling the House Foreign Affairs Committee about the administration’s efforts to crack down on the smuggling of AI GPUs to China. As Representative Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D.-Calif.) Questioned him concerning the quantity of H200 GPUs that have been authorized for trade since President Donald Trump delivered a complete U-turn on the export restrictions on the chip, he remarked, “My perception is that to date, None.
This is a blow to Nvidia’s dream of recapturing its market share in China, which has since fallen to zero from a high of 95% before Trump pulled the plug on H20 exports to the country in April 2025. There has been a lot of optimism in the company after it was finally allowed to sell the more powerful H200 GPU, with the company reportedly preparing 82,000 AI GPUs just two weeks after the White House announcement.
But as soon as Washington gave Nvidia the green light, Beijing immediately called for an emergency meeting with its biggest tech companies to determine demand for the graphics card. Four weeks later, it instructed them to pause H200 purchases as the national authorities were still weighing the process for bringing in these potent Nvidia GPUs. The CCP is currently navigating a predicament, as it desires its businesses to acquire chips manufactured within the country to assist in advancing its homegrown microchip sector, which it asserts can already match Nvidia’s defanged H20 and RTX Pro 6000D GPUs, yet also requires its AI enterprises to be able to compete against Western AI models with the use of the most powerful AI chips available.
In the end, it decided to limit H200 purchases to “special circumstances,” suggesting that only university R&D laboratories could acquire them. The U.S. Has also put rigorous mandates for export authorizations concerning the H200, making it difficult for organizations to get the numbers they need. Still, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is clinging to hope that Chinese companies would soon be allowed purchase from the company again. He even visited the country in late January, without a clear meeting with state authorities. Unfortunately, he returned empty-handed, confirming that Beijing has yet to decide on approvals for H200 imports. Currently, Trump is set to visit China during March, where he’s anticipated to talk about trade matters with Chinese President Xi Jinping, though it’s unclear whether these talks will cover Nvidia’s entry into the nation.
