US Says ‘Won’t Tolerate’ China’s ‘Coercive’ Micron Chip Ban

Micron is the only US-based player in the global market for memory chips. It is the first US chipmaker to be targeted by Beijing after export controls were imposed last October. Photo: Reuters

US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said on Saturday the United States “won’t tolerate” China’s ban on purchases of chips made by Micron Technology.

These “target a single US company without any basis in fact, and we see it as plain and simple economic coercion and we won’t tolerate it, nor do we think it will be successful,” Raimondo told a news conference after a meeting of trade ministers in the US-led Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) talks.

Raimondo added the US “firmly opposes” China’s actions against Micron and it is working closely with allies to address such “coercion.”

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Earlier this month, China’s cyberspace regulator blocked operators of key infrastructure from buying chips from Micron, saying it had failed its network security review.

The move came a day after leaders of the G7 industrial democracies agreed to new initiatives to push back against economic coercion by China – a decision noted by Raimondo.

“As we said at the G7 and as we have said consistently, we are closely engaging with partners addressing this specific challenge and all challenges related to China’s non-market practices.”

Raimondo also raised the Micron issue in a meeting on Thursday with China’s Commerce Minister, Wang Wentao.

Micron, the biggest US memory chip maker, generated around 11% of its revenue from sales in mainland China in the last fiscal year.

The company forecast a hit to revenue in the low-single to high-single digit percentage due to the ban by China.

Reuters, with additional editing by Vishakha Saxena

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Vishakha Saxena

Vishakha Saxena is the Multimedia and Social Media Editor at Asia Financial. She has been working as a digital journalist since 2013, and is an experienced writer and multimedia producer. As an eager stock market trader and investor, she is keenly interested in economy, emerging markets and the intersections of finance and society. You can tweet to her @saxenavishakha