FOURWEEKMBA TIMELINE ยท FROM THE NEWSROOM ยท UPDATED 2 NOVEMBER 2026
Free to share with a link to this page. China revenue and total revenue are Nvidia’s own filing lines, counted by where customers are headquartered; the shares are our arithmetic.
The short version: on Nvidia’s own count, China (including Hong Kong) was 20.2% of its revenue in fiscal 2024 and 7.0% in the first half of fiscal 2027 ($12.4B of $177.8B). In between, Washington set 6 successive rule regimes for Nvidia’s China chips, from the A100 and H100 licence of 26 Aug 2022 to the H200 case-by-case policy of 15 Jan 2026; Beijing opened an antitrust probe, summoned Nvidia over the H20’s security, and discouraged buyers from the chips Washington did allow. On 29 October 2026 the story moved to security: The New York Times reported that US officials believe a Megaspeed executive close to Jensen Huang is a Chinese intelligence asset. Nvidia says Huang’s contacts with her were not unusual; Beijing calls the report groundless.
This page puts every dated step in one place: 35 events from 26 Aug 2022 to 30 Oct 2026, each typed and sourced. 21 of them rest on primary documents: Nvidia’s 8-Ks, 10-Ks and 10-Qs, the Federal Register, the Commerce Department and Nvidia’s own statements. The rest are outlet reports, named in each row. Allegations are marked as allegations. Data as of 2 Nov 2026.
35 events, oldest first (on a phone, swipe the table sideways): 13 US export rules, licences or bills, 3 Chinese probes, 2 product moves, 7 China revenue disclosures, 4 security cases and 6 statements. A month without a day means the filing gives only the month. “Reported” means only the report’s date is known.
Date
Type
What happened
Source
26 Aug 2022
US export rule
US requires a licence for A100 and H100 sales to China The US government told Nvidia a new licence requirement applies, effective immediately, to exports of its A100 and forthcoming H100 to China (including Hong Kong) and Russia. Nvidia said its third-quarter outlook included about $400 million of potential China sales that could be affected.
US lets Nvidia keep developing H100 and route orders via Hong Kong for a year Nvidia said the US authorised the exports needed to keep developing H100, support US customers of A100 through 1 March 2023, and fulfil A100 and H100 orders through its Hong Kong facility through 1 September 2023.
Commerce writes the advanced-computing controls into the rules The Bureau of Industry and Security's rule on advanced computing and semiconductor manufacturing items took effect on 7 October 2022 and was published in the Federal Register on 13 October 2022 (87 FR 62186).
New performance thresholds catch the China versions A800 and H800 The US announced an interim final rule adding licence requirements for China and other D1, D4 and D5 countries on chips above new performance thresholds, naming among Nvidia's products the A100, A800, H100, H800, L40, L40S and RTX 4090, and for any buyer headquartered in a D5 country, including China.
The 2023 rule takes effect at once instead of in 30 days The US told Nvidia the new requirements for data-centre products with a total processing performance of 4800 or more were effective immediately, hitting A100, A800, H100, H800 and L40S shipments. The rule was published on 25 October 2023 (88 FR 73458).
China's market regulator opens an antitrust probe into Nvidia China's State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) said it had opened an investigation into Nvidia for suspected breaches of the Anti-Monopoly Law and of the conditions it attached in 2020 to Nvidia's purchase of Mellanox.
The AI Diffusion rule: a worldwide licence on data-centre chips The outgoing administration issued the AI Diffusion interim final rule, published on 15 January 2025, with a worldwide licence requirement on chips including the A100, H100, H200, B200 and GB200, and compliance due on 15 May 2025.
Fiscal 2025 10-K: China at $17.1B by billing address Nvidia's fiscal 2025 annual report, which counted revenue by where customers are billed, put China (including Hong Kong) at $17,108 million of $130,497 million, and said Singapore, a billing hub, was 18% of revenue.
H20, the chip built for China, now needs a licence The US told Nvidia that its H20, and any chip matching its memory or interconnect bandwidth, needs a licence for China (including Hong Kong and Macau); on 14 April it said the requirement would stay for the indefinite future. Nvidia expected up to about $5.5 billion of charges.
Commerce rescinds the AI Diffusion rule before it bites The Commerce Department announced it would rescind the AI Diffusion rule and replace it later, and issued guidance warning about the risks of using Chinese chips including specific Huawei Ascend parts.
H20 write-down: a $4.5B charge Nvidia booked a $4.5 billion charge for excess H20 inventory and purchase obligations, less than first expected; H20 sales had been $4.6 billion in the quarter before the licence rule.
China's internet regulator summons Nvidia over H20 'backdoor' risks The Cyberspace Administration of China summoned Nvidia and asked it to explain, with supporting documents, alleged vulnerability and backdoor security risks in the H20.
Nvidia: 'No backdoors. No kill switches. No spyware.' Nvidia's chief security officer wrote that its GPUs do not and should not have kill switches or backdoors.
H20 licences granted; Washington expects a 15% cut The US granted licences for certain H20 shipments to certain China-based customers; officials said they expected 15% of the revenue from licensed H20 sales, with no regulation published. Nvidia later said Beijing restricted those sales and the licences produced about $60 million of H20 revenue.
B30A: a Blackwell chip for China, reported in development Reuters reported, citing two sources, that Nvidia was developing a Blackwell-based chip for China tentatively named B30A, more capable than the H20. US approval was not guaranteed.
No H20 sales to China in the quarter Nvidia reported no H20 sales to China-based customers in the quarter to July 2025; it sold about $650 million of H20 to an unrestricted customer outside China.
SAMR's preliminary finding: Nvidia broke the Mellanox conditions China's antitrust regulator published a preliminary finding that Nvidia had violated the Anti-Monopoly Law and the conditions of its Mellanox approval, and opened a further investigation. In Nvidia's words, the finding was that complying with US export controls, which required degraded products for China, discriminated against Chinese customers.
Huang: 'We went from 95% market share to 0%' At a Citadel Securities event, Jensen Huang said Nvidia was "100% out of China" and had gone from 95% market share to zero, as reported by Tom's Hardware.
NYT: Commerce investigates Megaspeed over possible chip diversion The New York Times reported that Commerce Department officials were investigating whether Megaspeed, a Singapore-based data-centre company that was poised to buy $2 billion of Nvidia technology, was helping Chinese companies sidestep export rules. Allegation, as reported.
Senate passes the GAIN AI Act inside the defence bill (not law) The Senate passed the GAIN AI Act as part of the NDAA; Nvidia warned it would restrict the administration's ability to adapt export rules. It is a bill, not a rule in force.
Nvidia recounts China by customer headquarters: $3.0B in the quarter Nvidia switched to counting revenue by customer headquarters and recast prior periods; China was $2,973 million of $57,006 million in the quarter to October 2025, against $8,142 million a year earlier.
Trump: H200 can go to China, with a 25% cut for the US President Trump said on Truth Social that Nvidia's H200 could be exported to approved customers in China with 25% paid to the US, up from the 15% proposed in August; Blackwell and Rubin were not part of the deal, Reuters reported.
House passes the Remote Access Security Act, 369-22 (not law) The House voted 369-22 for H.R. 2683, which would add remote access (renting chips in other countries) to the export-control statute; the Senate companion had not passed, per our newsroom's reading of the roll call.
Commerce moves H200 to case-by-case review A Commerce rule, effective 15 January 2026, changed licence review for chips such as the H200 to China and Macau from a presumption of denial to case-by-case, with conditions including independent third-party testing in the United States.
First H200 licence: small amounts, a US inspection and a 25% tariff The US granted a licence for small amounts of H200 to specific China-based customers; the chips must be inspected in the United States first, so they carry a 25% import tariff.
Fiscal 2026 10-K: China $19.7B, and 'effectively foreclosed' On the headquarters count, China was $19,677 million of $215,938 million in fiscal 2026, down from a recast $25,048 million. Nvidia said that as of the year-end it was "effectively foreclosed" from China's data-centre compute market.
Short seller alleges China diversion; Huang joins Trump's Beijing trip Culper Research, which disclosed a short position, alleged that more than 20% of Nvidia's fiscal 2026 compute revenue was still China-driven through diversion, Benzinga reported, the day Huang joined President Trump's Beijing summit. Nvidia had told the Times that Megaspeed has no China shareholders. Allegation, as reported.
Chinese labs reported renting Nvidia GB300s in Southeast Asia CNBC reported that several Chinese firms were reaching advanced Nvidia compute through data centres in Southeast Asia, and that White House official Michael Kratsios had accused Moonshot AI in July of using GB300 chips via a facility in Thailand.
China $7.9B in a quarter; Beijing still blocks H200 buys China was $7,880 million of $96,221 million in the quarter to July 2026. Nvidia said licensed H200 sales were restricted by the PRC government, took a $0.4 billion H200 charge in the half-year, and said H200 shipments were less than 1% of Data Center revenue.
RTX PRO 5500: Chinese giants order $35B of an export-compliant card ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent ordered more than 3 million RTX PRO 5500 cards, over $35 billion at sticker price, Reuters reported citing sources; Nvidia told partners it could not guarantee supply. Reuters noted the B300 cannot be sold to Chinese buyers.
POLITICO: Trump reversed limits on some Nvidia chips; White House disputes it POLITICO reported that President Trump had reversed limits on sales of some powerful Nvidia chips to Chinese companies in exchange for a significant cut of the revenue; a White House official disputed that restrictions were eased.
NYT: officials see Huang as target of a China spy plot The New York Times reported that US officials believe Megaspeed executive Alice Huang is a Chinese intelligence asset who stayed close to Jensen Huang, and that President Trump was briefed and took no action. Allegation, as reported; no charge was reported.
Nvidia: diversion claims were 'investigated and debunked' An Nvidia spokesperson told CNBC that Megaspeed is one of its regional cloud customers, that Huang's contacts with its officials were not unusual, and that the diversion allegations were investigated and debunked last year.
Beijing: 'groundless speculation' China's foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun called the Times report groundless speculation and an attempt to smear China, AFP reported.
The first US regime, the 2022 licence on the A100 and H100, held for over a year; Nvidia answered it with China versions, the A800 and H800, which the October 2023 rule then caught. Since 2025 the rules have turned over faster: the AI Diffusion rule was rescinded before it was enforced, the H20 went from a licence requirement (April 2025) to licences with a 15% revenue expectation (August 2025), and the H200 moved to case-by-case review with a 25% tariff (15 Jan 2026). The current regime has been in force for 10 months. On the Chinese side, SAMR’s Mellanox probe has run since 9 Dec 2024, and Nvidia says Beijing has restricted the licensed H20 and H200 sales since August 2025.
China revenue, quarter by quarter
On the headquarters count, China was $9.7B in the quarter to April 2025, when the H20 licence rule arrived, and $3.0B two quarters later (5.2% of revenue). It has since risen to $7.9B (8.2%) in the quarter to July 2026, while Nvidia says licensed H200 shipments were under 1% of Data Center revenue. The filings count direct customers by headquarters, not where the chips end up, so the China line is not a measure of chips used in China. The billing-address count Nvidia used until 2025 gave lower figures: 13.1% for fiscal 2025 against 19.2% on the recount.
From chips to compliance. Until 2025 the question was which Nvidia chips could legally go to China; the company kept designing versions under each threshold (A800, H800, H20). From April 2025 even the China versions needed licences, and when licences came they carried a revenue share for Washington (15% expected for H20, 25% for H200) that no regulation codifies, as Nvidia notes in its filings.
Two governments, not one. Nvidia’s filings now say it cannot sell a competitive data-centre product in China without approval from both the US and Chinese governments. Beijing’s tools are a market-regulation probe (the Mellanox conditions), a cybersecurity summons (H20 “backdoors”) and, Nvidia says, discouraging buyers from its export-compliant chips.
From compliance to security. The cases in 2025-2026 are about where chips go after they are sold: the Commerce probe into Megaspeed reported by the Times, Chinese labs reported to rent Nvidia’s newest chips in Southeast Asia, a short seller’s diversion claims, and now officials’ belief, reported by the Times, that a Megaspeed executive was a Chinese intelligence asset close to Huang. None of these is a finding against Nvidia, and Nvidia rejects the diversion claims; together they explain why Congress is weighing remote-access and chip-tracking bills.
The risks, as each party states them
Nvidia says in its fiscal 2026 10-K that being shut out of China helped competitors build larger developer and customer ecosystems to challenge it worldwide. Nvidia Form 10-K, fiscal 2026
Nvidia says Beijing has encouraged customers to buy from Chinese competitors and discouraged them from buying even its China-specific, export-compliant products (10-Q, quarter to July 2026). Nvidia Form 10-Q, quarter to 26 Jul 2026
If SAMR concludes Nvidia broke the Mellanox conditions, Nvidia says it could face financial penalties and restrictions, including on its networking business (fiscal 2026 10-K). Nvidia Form 10-K, fiscal 2026
Nvidia says it may not be able to pass the 25% H200 tariff on to customers (fiscal 2026 10-K). Nvidia Form 10-K, fiscal 2026
IDC data reported by Reuters put Nvidia at 34% of China's data-centre AI chip market in the first half of 2026, with Huawei at 28% on 572,000 units. Reuters (IDC data), via Yahoo Finance
Diversion: short seller Culper Research (short the stock) alleges more than 20% of fiscal 2026 compute revenue was China-driven through diversion; Nvidia says diversion claims about Megaspeed were investigated and debunked. Allegations, not findings. Benzinga, via Yahoo Finance
What is not in the table yet
Launch dates of the China-only A800 and H800 (2022-2023) and of the H20: no primary or stored source yet; they appear here only as products named in the October 2023 rule.
Whether the B30A was ever approved or shipped: no source after the August 2025 Reuters report.
SAMR's own notices (samr.gov.cn) and China's foreign-ministry transcript were not readable from here; the Chinese steps are quoted from HK01, Cailian Press and The Paper (which quote the regulators) and AFP via our newsroom.
The New York Times articles (October 2025, October 2026), the POLITICO report and the Reuters order report are paywalled or blocked; they are quoted as our newsroom reported them, with links to the originals.
BIS guidance of 31 May 2026 on the replacement for the AI Diffusion rule is cited in a July 2026 Federal Register rule but not stored here.
Nvidia has not yet filed results for the quarter to October 2026, so the latest China line is the quarter to July 2026.
FAQ
Can Nvidia sell AI chips to China?
Only some, with licences, and Beijing has restricted those sales. Since 15 Jan 2026 the US reviews H200 licences to China case by case, with US testing and a 25% tariff; Blackwell chips such as the B300 cannot be sold to Chinese buyers, Reuters reported in October 2026. Nvidia says the licensed H200 shipments were less than 1% of Data Center revenue in the quarter to July 2026.
How much of Nvidia’s revenue comes from China?
$19.7B of $215.9B in fiscal 2026 (9.1%), and $7.9B (8.2%) in the quarter to July 2026, counted by customer headquarters (our arithmetic for the shares). Read how much of Nvidia’s revenue really comes from China.
What was the H20?
The data-centre chip Nvidia designed to sell in China under the 2023 rules. Its sales were $4.6 billion in the quarter to April 2025, before the US required a licence on 9 Apr 2025; Nvidia then took a $4.5 billion charge. Licences granted in August 2025 produced about $60 million of H20 revenue, Nvidia says.
Why is China investigating Nvidia?
SAMR opened an antitrust probe on 9 Dec 2024 over the conditions China set in 2020 for Nvidia’s purchase of Mellanox; on 15 Sep 2025 it published a preliminary finding that Nvidia broke them. Separately, the Cyberspace Administration summoned Nvidia on 31 Jul 2025 over alleged H20 security risks; Nvidia says its GPUs have no backdoors or kill switches.
What is the Megaspeed and Jensen Huang story?
The New York Times reported on 29 October 2026 that US officials believe Alice Huang, a Megaspeed executive, is a Chinese intelligence asset who stayed close to Jensen Huang. Nvidia says his contacts with her were not unusual and that diversion claims about Megaspeed were investigated and debunked; Beijing calls the report groundless. No charge was reported. Read our story.
How often is this page updated?
Weekly. New Nvidia-China facts logged by our newsroom are checked each week, every quote is re-verified against its stored source, and the revenue lines are updated when Nvidia files its next 10-Q or 10-K.
Built by FourWeekMBA from 31 stored sources: Nvidia’s SEC filings and blog, the Federal Register and the Commerce Department first, then the outlets named in each row, and our newsroom’s database for the China revenue lines. Every quote is checked against a stored copy of its source before each rebuild, and every number in a row must appear in its quotes. Revenue shares, the derived fourth quarters and the regime durations are our arithmetic. Allegations are reported as allegations, with the response of the people and companies named.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
