China Market Intelligence

During its final month in office, the Biden administration has released a slew of measures regulating commercial relations with China, capping off years of work in some areas and jumpstarting new types of rulemaking in others. Recent measures include precedent-setting export controls on the semiconductors needed to power artificial intelligence (AI) models, new blacklistings, and a Section 301 investigation.

Amid an economic downturn and growing pressure to restore foreign investor confidence, China’s Ministry of Finance (MOF) recently published a draft definition of “domestic products” for government procurement. The move aims to establish a nationwide standard. However, its effectiveness in resolving longstanding issues facing the business community in this area remains to be seen.

With Republicans maintaining control of the House of Representatives in the 119th Congress, which runs from now through December 2026, many of the same China policy priorities from last year are expected to stay front and center. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) is likely to task standing committee chairs with keeping the pressure on China-related proposals, though these will have to be balanced with other Republican priorities like immigration policy and tax cuts.

Chinese tech startups may have found a new lifeline as venture capital investment in the country declines. Driven by waning investor confidence and mounting geopolitical tensions, nearly 40 percent of domestic and foreign venture capital funds have scaled back their China operations in the first nine months of 2024, resulting in a $5 billion investment decrease compared with 2023.

The global automotive industry is at a crossroads. Chinese automakers have captured over two-thirds of China’s auto market and expanded abroad rapidly, helping the country become the world’s number one producer and exporter of vehicles. Chinese automotive suppliers, most notably electric vehicle (EV) battery makers, are establishing factories overseas and licensing their technology to foreign automakers.

China has seen several high-level personnel changes at the central and provincial levels in recent months. A partner of USCBC, Wang Jiangping (王江平), stepped down as vice minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) last month upon reaching retirement age.

The United States on December 2 released the third iteration of controls on the export of advanced chips and chipmaking equipment to China, as well as outright bans on exports to certain Chinese companies. These new US rules are technically challenging and will require significant overhauls to semiconductor companies’ compliance architectures.

Growth in bilateral trade occurred amid a broader 7.7 percent increase in US-worldwide trade. Several key import and export categories experienced significant growth, including US small electrical appliance imports and aerospace exports.

President-elect Donald Trump has wasted little time in announcing a series of nominations for key positions in his administration as he prepares for his second term. Many, if not all, of Trump’s nominees hold hardline views on China.

President-elect Donald Trump and many other Republicans have made clear their intention to revoke China’s permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) status with the United States, a power that resides with Congress. Some, however, see the need for even higher tariffs than what would result from a so-called clean PNTR repeal, which has led to growing calls for the United States to both revoke China’s status and create a new tariff column entirely—column 3—designed specifically for imports from China.