Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang isn’t part of Trump’s China trip
U.S. President Donald Trump (left) listens to Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang speak in the Cross Hall of the White House during the “Investing in America” event on April 30, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Andrew Harnik | Getty Images
BEIJING — Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said it would be “a great honor” to travel to China with Donald Trump. However, he is not among the executives who joined the US president to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping; It’s a sign that the chipmaker’s sales in one of its most important markets are unlikely to rebound anytime soon.
Huang has visited China multiple times over the past 18 months, including a high-profile trip last summer; That underscored Nvidia’s efforts to maintain ties with a market that once accounted for at least a fifth of data center revenue.
But he is absent from Trump’s closely watched visit this week, when more than a dozen U.S. executives will join the president, including chip company Qualcomm’s Cristiano Amon, Tesla’s Elon Musk and Apple’s Tim Cook. Boeing’s Kelly Ortberg is also part of the delegation, as the US aircraft manufacturer is expected to receive its first large order from China in years.
Nvidia’s most advanced chips, widely used to train artificial intelligence models, have faced tighter U.S. restrictions on Chinese sales over the past four years. The company said in February that U.S. government-approved versions of the chips were not yet allowed into China.
The U.S. chipmaker’s China sales are unlikely to rebound anytime soon, experts told CNBC.
Hao Hong, chief investment officer at Lotus Asset Management, told CNBC’s Emily Tan on “The China Connection” on Tuesday that Nvidia would gain “very little” in terms of output if Huang joined Trump’s delegation.
“A more advanced form of Nvidia chips is unlikely to be approved by the Trump administration for China to purchase,” Hong said, adding that the technology “divergence” between the US and China would likely increase.
“I think China has realized that technology competition between the two countries will be one of the key determining factors going forward in determining the relative competitive position between the two countries in global geopolitics,” Hong said.
Nvidia did not immediately respond to a request for comment from CNBC.
“We should let the president announce whatever he decides to announce… It would be a privilege if he were invited, it would be a great honor to represent the United States,” Huang told CNBC’s Jim Cramer last week.
Trump is scheduled to arrive in Beijing late Wednesday local time for two days of talks with Xi. This will be the first visit by a sitting US president in nearly a decade.
