President Donald Trump on Monday said that the US would allow tech company Nvidia to sell its H200 chips to China.
Mr Trump said he had told Chinese President Xi Jinping that the chips, important to the development of artificial intelligence, could be sold to "approved customers in China and other countries under conditions that allow for continued strong national security".
"President Xi responded positively," Mr Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social, saying that "25 per cent" would be paid to the US. The meaning of this claim was unclear.
"This policy will support American jobs, strengthen US manufacturing, and benefit American taxpayers," he wrote.
The decision comes after weeks of speculation over whether the Trump administration would approve the sale of the chips.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had said in late November that the decision ultimately rested with Mr Trump.
The President accused the Biden administration of making "our great companies … spend billions of dollars building 'degraded' products that nobody wanted, a terrible idea that slowed innovation, and hurt the American worker".
The H200 is not Nvidia’s most advanced product. Those chips, called Blackwell and the coming Rubin, were not part of what Mr Trump approved.
Officials have expressed concerns over national security and sought to keep China away from US-designed technology amid the global race for AI dominance.
