Jensen Huang attends the 2025 Queen Elizabeth Engineering Awards Reception held at St. James’s Palace on November 5, 2025 in Briline, London.
Mok Yui | via Reuters
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang reportedly told the Financial Times on Wednesday that “China will win the AI race,” but shortly after issued a noticeably softer statement.
Speaking on the sidelines of the FT’s Future of AI Summit, the prolific technology leader warned that China will beat the US in artificial intelligence thanks to lower energy costs and less regulation.
The comments, which CNBC could not independently verify, may represent Hwang’s starkest warning yet that the United States is at risk of losing its global lead in advanced AI technology.
However, hours after the FT published its report, Nvidia released another statement from Jensen on its official X account.
“As I have said for some time, China is nanoseconds behind the United States in AI. It is important that the United States wins by racing ahead and acquiring developers from around the world,” he added.
Mr. Huang has long said that the United States would have an advantage in the AI race if developers continued to rely on Nvidia’s leading AI chips, an argument the CEO has used to lobby against export restrictions on his company’s sales to China.
After a meeting with US President Donald Trump in July, Mr Hwang’s efforts appeared to be working, with Washington agreeing to ease some chip restrictions.
Under the plan, Nvidia and competing AI chip company AMD agreed to pay the U.S. government 15% of Chinese revenue from sales of existing AI processors tailored to the market.
But the Chinese government has since barred Nvidia from the market as it conducts national security reviews of its chips, and Huang said the company’s market share has dropped to zero.
It remains unclear whether China will allow Nvidia’s chips to return as authorities look to domestic tech companies to replace domestic AI chips. But some experts speculate that the Chinese government may be using Nvidia’s market access as leverage in trade negotiations or to push Washington for greater access to advanced semiconductors.
Hwang visited South Korea last month for a meeting between President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping. The highly anticipated trade talks between the two leaders resulted in neither side making any concessions on tipping policy.
According to the Wall Street Journal, President Trump initially sought to discuss Mr. Huang’s request to allow the sale of a new generation of AI chips to China. But government officials balked at the idea, the newspaper reported, citing anonymous current and former administration officials familiar with the matter.
Now, as Nvidia’s access to China remains frozen, Huang appears to be shifting his attention to other things he believes are essential to Nvidia’s growth and AI competition.
In an interview with the FT, Huang reportedly expressed concern that Western countries, including the United States, are being held back by “cynicism” and overregulation, in contrast to China’s energy subsidies aimed at reducing costs for local developers who use domestically produced chips.
