Chinese tech giants reportedly order over $35 billion in Nvidia chips

what happened

According to Reuters, as reported by TradingView, ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent have placed orders for more than 3 million professional graphics cards from Nvidia. The combined list price tops $35 billion. Each card costs roughly $11,400 and is built for high-end workstations rather than large data centers, yet it ranks among the strongest Nvidia chips still open to Chinese buyers.

The move comes as Chinese firms look for alternatives under U.S. curbs on advanced AI chips. Blackwell-based B300 processors for data centers cannot be sold to China, while H200 shipments require case-by-case review and licenses. Nvidia has warned buyers it may not be able to fulfill everything, and one source said customers could receive only 5% to 10% of requested volumes. Early samples are promised for December, with commercial deliveries starting in the first quarter of 2027. Sources say the cards will mainly run AI inference, meaning the execution of already trained models.

why it matters

For markets, the report suggests Chinese demand for Nvidia hardware holds up despite export limits, while tight supply favors the chipmaker. Reports also say TSMC capacity will largely shift to the next-generation Rubin platform from 2027. None of the companies has publicly confirmed the order details.

market impact

NVDA and TSM: strong Chinese demand supports sales outlook, while export limits and supply shortfalls add risk.

tags

instruments