China has rejected allegations that it used a woman to gather information from Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang, describing the claims as unproven and part of a campaign to damage Beijing's reputation. The denial came at a routine foreign ministry briefing on Monday, according to RTE.ie, and followed Nvidia's announcement that it had launched an independent investigation into reports that its long-serving CEO had been the focus of a foreign intelligence operation.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Guo Jiakun told reporters that the espionage claim had no basis and amounted to nothing more than an attempt to smear China. Beijing had previously pushed back on reporting in the New York Times that US intelligence had concluded the woman was collecting information on behalf of the Chinese government.
Why it matters
Nvidia sits alongside Apple and Microsoft among the most valuable listed companies in the world, and it is the dominant supplier of the chips that power artificial intelligence systems. Its chief executive has led the firm for more than three decades and is closely identified with its rise, so uncertainty about his position carries weight for investors and for the wider technology supply chain.
The affair also lands in the middle of a sensitive stretch in US-China relations over advanced computing technology. Washington has used export controls since 2022 to limit Beijing's access to cutting-edge Nvidia chips and the equipment used to manufacture them, while Huang has spent recent years lobbying American officials to relax those limits.
Huang admits relationship and backs inquiry
Huang published an open letter on Nvidia's website in which he acknowledged he had been intimate with a business executive and apologised to his wife and to the company. He did not identify the woman. In the same letter he said he supported the investigation and would cooperate fully, adding that he loved his country and his company and was committed to protecting Nvidia and supporting US national security, according to RTE.ie.
Nvidia said a day earlier that it was running an independent probe into reports that its CEO had been targeted by a foreign intelligence effort. The New York Times reported that US intelligence had determined the woman was gathering information for Beijing. The newspaper identified her as Alice Huang, a Chinese citizen and former executive at Megaspeed International, a Singapore-based data centre company whose website highlights its partnership with Nvidia. The company had faced claims last year that it was illicitly shipping advanced Nvidia chips to China.
Washington pressure and market reaction
Senior Republican figures in the US House of Representatives had already asked Huang to brief Congress this month on the New York Times reporting. In a letter dated 4 November, they said the matter raised serious national security questions about China's access to sensitive American technology and information, and argued that lawmakers needed to establish how far US security had been put at risk.
Analysts said the episode could weigh on the stock and on Huang's standing. Dan Ives, a partner and senior managing director at Yorkville Ives & Co, said there was a clear risk the CEO could be removed depending on the board's findings, which would add risk to the shares given how central Huang is to Nvidia's global strategy. He described the situation as a damaging moment for Huang that would prompt congressional scrutiny at a minimum and increase attention on chip sales to China.
Josh Gilbert, lead analyst at the trading platform eToro, said Huang's influence runs through every stage of the company's growth, so any question over his role matters to shareholders. He said the investigation would likely hurt sentiment but would not change anything in the long term unless it produced a change at the top, at which point the picture would shift entirely.
The Guardian reported that Nvidia shares fell after news of the honeytrap investigation emerged. The BBC characterised the episode as a personal scandal engulfing a Silicon Valley figure who has become one of the industry's most prominent executives.
Beijing's response and the chip backdrop
Chinese state media have concentrated largely on Huang's admission of the affair, and official outlets have broadly repeated the government's position. The state-owned Global Times suggested the New York Times report was intended to unsettle relations between Washington and Beijing, arguing that whenever ties between the two countries start to improve, unnamed actors fire shots from the shadows.
The commercial backdrop remains complicated. Huang has pressed Washington to ease restrictions on Nvidia's sales to China, and this year won President Donald Trump's approval to sell the company's H200 chips there. Those chips are not Nvidia's most advanced models but remain capable. It is not clear whether Beijing would permit Chinese firms to buy them in large volumes; Nvidia said in an August regulatory filing that only a small quantity had been sold to China because the Chinese government restricts such purchases. Huang had earlier lobbied for permission to sell the less advanced H20 chips, which were designed to comply with US export rules.
George Chen, a partner and chairman of the digital practice at the Washington consultancy Asia Group, said the central questions were whether Huang knew of any espionage activity and whether confidential or strategically sensitive information was compromised.
What to watch next is the outcome of Nvidia's board-led investigation and whether Huang appears before lawmakers as requested.
