The tiny government agency behind a Chinese A.I. chip ban that’s weighing on Nvidia
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo testifies before a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., Feb. 1, 2022.
Andrew Harnik | Reuters
As reports swirl about potential U.S. limits on semiconductor exports to China, a small division within the sprawling U.S. Department of Commerce is taking on an outsize role.
The Bureau of Industry and Security was described by Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo in 2021 as the “small but mighty” agency at the center of federal national security efforts. That’s especially true now, with President Joe Biden considering stricter controls on the export of powerful artificial intelligence computing chips to the world’s second-largest economy.
The BIS is responsible for implementing the U.S. export control regime, preventing critical high-tech and defense products from getting into the hands of the wrong companies or governments. The decisions made by the BIS about who can and can’t access U.S. technology can have a major effect on corporate bottom lines.
Chipmakers have already taken a hit as a result of BIS-imposed restrictions. In 2022, the BIS warned Nvidia that new licensing requirements precluded the export of the company’s advanced A100 and H100 chips to China without obtaining a license from the Commerce Department, part of the Biden administration’s sweeping effort to curb Chinese technological advancement.
Nvidia warned in August 2022 that about $400 million in potential Chinese sales would be lost unless customers purchased “alternative product offerings.” Just a few months later, Nvidia began to offer a watered-down version of its flagship AI chip for the Chinese market. Dubbed the A800, its lower-end specifications exempted it from Commerce Department licensing requirements.
But The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that even the less-powerful Nvidia offering could be restricted from export at the direction of President Biden. The BIS declined to comment on a potential tightening of export controls. Nvidia shares, which have soared 180% this year largely on AI hype, fell 2% after the WSJ story.
Through its Commerce Control List, the BIS can define which product specifications require licenses to be sold overseas. The criteria can be so specific that only a handful of commercially available items apply.
While the Commerce Control List isn’t intended to single out any one vendor, there are very few companies that develop the kind of high-octane processors that power AI models. Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices lead that group.
If an export restriction were implemented, those companies would be responsible for ensuring their high-tech processors don’t end up in the Chinese markets.
In one high-profile enforcement case, the BIS took aim at hard drive manufacturer Seagate over the company’s decision to continue supplying Huawei after the Chinese company was blacklisted in 2020. Seagate was fined $300 million by the government. But the financial effect was much greater, as Seagate had a $1.1 billion business in China.
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Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, Palantir Technologies, and Founders Fund, holds hundred dollar bills as he speaks during the Bitcoin 2022 Conference at Miami Beach Convention Center on April 7, 2022 in Miami, Florida.
Marco Bello | Getty Images
The Peter Thiel-backed cryptocurrency exchange Bullish filed for an IPO on Friday, the latest digital asset firm to head for the public market.
The company, led by CEO Tom Farley, a veteran of the finance industry and former president of the New York Stock Exchange, said it plans to trade on the NYSE under the ticker symbol “BLSH.”
A spinout of Block.one, Bullish started with an initial investment from backers including Thiel’s Founders Fund and Thiel Capital, along with Nomura, Mike Novogratz and others. Bullish acquired crypto news site CoinDesk in 2023.
“In the first quarter of 2025, Bullish exchange executed over $2.5 billion in average daily volume, ranking in the top five exchanges by spot volume for Bitcoin and Ether,” the company said on its website. The prospectus listed top competitors as Binance, Coinbase and Kraken.
The IPO filing says that as of March 31, the total trading volume since launch has exceeded $1.25 trillion.
The filing is another significant step for the cryptocurrency industry, which has fought for years to convince institutions to embrace digital assets as legitimate investments.
It’s already been a big year on the market for crypto offerings, highlighted by stablecoin issuer Circle, which has jumped more than sevenfold since its IPO in June. Etoro, an online trading platform that includes services for crypto investors, debuted in May.
Novogratz‘s crypto firm Galaxy Digital started trading on the Nasdaq in May, moving its listing from the Toronto Stock Exchange. And in June, Gemini, the cryptocurrency exchange and custodian founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, confidentially filed for an IPO in the U.S.
Meanwhile, investors continue to flock to bitcoin. The digital currency is trading at over $117,000, up from about $94,000 at the start of the year.
President Donald Trump, on Friday, signed the GENIUS Act into law — a set of regulations that establish some initial consumer protections around stablecoins, which are tied to assets like the U.S. dollar with the intent of reducing price volatility associated with many cryptocurrencies.
In its filing with the SEC, Bullish says its mission is partly to “drive the adoption of stablecoins, digital assets, and blockchain technology.”
Crypto industry players, including Thiel, Elon Musk, and President Trump’s AI and Crypto czar David Sacks spent heavily to re-elect Trump and have pushed for legislation that legitimizes digital assets and exchanges.
WATCH: Trump’s crypto plan
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