I have to say, Trump really knows how to make money!
The British media Financial Times previously reported that American chip companies Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) have agreed to "tribute" 15% of their chip sales revenue in China to the U.S. government in exchange for export licenses issued by the Trump administration. This news shocked the public, with American media exclaiming that asking companies for a portion of their revenue in exchange for export licenses is "unprecedented."
At the White House press conference held on Monday (the 11th), Trump confirmed this matter and revealed more details of the private negotiations. According to reports from CNN and Politico among others, Trump admitted that he asked Nvidia to pay a fee for the chip export license to China and initially proposed taking 20% of the sales.
"I said, 'If I approve your doing this (exporting to China), I want 20% (of the revenue). It's for the country, for our country. I don't want it for myself,'" Trump responded to a reporter's question, "Then he said, 'Can we lower it to 15%?' So we made a small deal."
Regarding concerns that approving this deal would undermine national security, Trump seemed unconcerned. To prove his point, he described Nvidia's recently restored H20 chip exports to China as "obsolete" products, and stated that China has "long had" chips that perform similarly to the H20.
Trump then claimed that he plans to negotiate a new agreement with Jensen Huang to allow Nvidia to sell chips based on its latest and most advanced Blackwell platform to China, but on the condition that their performance is reduced by "30% to 50%."
"This is the latest and most advanced chip globally, no one else has it, and they won't get it for five years," he added, "I think he (Jensen Huang) will come back to meet with me to discuss this, but it will be a 'downgraded version' of that high-end chip."
