#big-tech-china-relations

#big-tech-china-relations

Apple is, in this type of environment, really going to try and maximize gross profit dollars, not gross margins. And that is through pricing, that is through supply chain actions.

In recent weeks, China approved the world's first commercial brain-computer interface medical device and unveiled a five-ton class electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft that has already completed a public flight.

The S&P 500 closed up approximately 2.4% near 6,496, while the Nasdaq Composite gained roughly 3.3% to around 21,475, indicating a strong market response to geopolitical news.

The January 3rd Operation Absolute Resolve ousted Venezuelan Dictator Nicholas Maduro, marking a significant shift in US policy towards countering adversarial influence in the western hemisphere.

According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, the Trump administration is set to receive a total of $10 billion in the deal that allowed TikTok to remain in the US. The new investors who acquired stakes in the US entity of TikTok already paid a $2.5 billion fee to the administration when the deal closed in January, but WSJ's latest report noted that the group of investors would continue to make payments until the total hits $10 billion.

In September, Donald Trump claimed that 'the United States is getting a tremendous fee' for brokering the TikTok deal. Now sources tell the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times that fee is expected to be in the range of $10 billion. The money is supposedly being paid by new investors, including Oracle and Silver Lake.

Warning to the invading American ruling establishment and its affiliated spy companies. You ignored our repeated warnings about the necessity of halting terrorist operations, and today, in terrorist attacks carried out by you and your Israeli allies, a number of Iranian citizens were martyred.

The gist of it is that US actions such as prosecuting Binance co-founder Zhao Changpeng and chasing alleged cyber-scam camp operator Chen Zhi were not law enforcement actions but attempts to ensure US hegemony over cryptocurrencies and preserve the role of the US dollar as the de facto currency of world trade.

TikTok was technically banned in the U.S. as of January 19th, 2025, as part of the Senate-approved " Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act." But upon his inauguration as President on January 20th, President Trump issued an Executive Order to withhold enforcement of the bill, in order to give his team an opportunity to potentially re-negotiate the details.

The United States has realised it cannot keep trying to police the whole world, argues Victor Gao, the vice president of the Center for China and Globalization in Beijing. Gao tells host Steve Clemons that improved China-US relations are inevitable although he warns that some American policymakers still view China as the number one threat and Chinese officials never underestimate what American neofascists will cook up next.

[The Trump administration] may have entered the office thinking that they could use their economic leverage to push China in certain policy directions," said Amanda Hsiao, a China studies director at the Eurasia Group consultancy.

The operation reveals a broader strategy: if you can't build it, take it. With a blend of state-run espionage and corporate infiltration, China has turned technology acquisition into an art form. Their 'all-of-the-above' approach has allowed their AI sector to grow even as export bans tighten. By sourcing the hardware from elsewhere, Beijing has made the lack of domestic chip manufacture moot.