Great reporting by @nytimes. The US Commerce Dept was approving sales of Nvidia chips to companies in China which either did not exist, were on the sanctions list, and/or had ties to China's military. A brief visit by journalists in China found that two of the offices were just empty shells. Was Jensen Huang a "victim" of a honey trap or was he just trying to make as much money as possible? Was his $25 million donation to Trump's ballroom the price of pay to play? In the US - China tech competition, has the Commerce Dept been co-opted by other interests? Here is a gift article which raises deeply troubling questions. Explore this gift article from The New York Times. You can read it for free without a subscription.

Volkswagen pulled out of China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region after 12 rather shameful years. German automaker’s exit demonstrated the near impossibility of operating responsibly in a region where the UN concluded in 2022, following a landmark investigation, that a “pattern of large-scale arbitrary detention occurred” in Xinjiang that could constitute “crimes against humanity”. Charbucks will not be getting my business.