Trump Blocks Chinese Acquisition of US Microchip Manufacturer

chicom-us-flags

Via Bloomberg:

President Donald Trump blocked a Chinese-backed investor from buying Lattice Semiconductor Corp., a personal rebuke that bodes poorly for several other Chinese buyers seeking U.S. security clearance for their acquisitions.

It was just the fourth time in a quarter century that a U.S. president has ordered a foreign takeover of an American firm stopped because of national-security risks. Trump acted on the recommendation of a multi-agency panel, the White House and the Treasury Department said Wednesday. The spurned buyer, Canyon Bridge Capital Partners LLC, is a private-equity firm backed by a Chinese state-owned asset manager.

The national-security risks posed by the deal included “the Chinese government’s role in supporting this transaction, the importance of semiconductor supply chain integrity to the United States government, and the use of Lattice products by the United States government,” the White House said.

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According to Bloomberg, more deals are also in question now:

The Trump administration has maintained the U.S.’s tough stance against Chinese takeovers of American businesses even as it seeks China’s help to resolve the North Korean nuclear crisis. Other Chinese deals under review include MoneyGram International Inc.’s proposed sale to Ant Financial, the financial-services company controlled by Chinese billionaire Jack Ma. The government is also examining an agreement by Chinese conglomerate HNA Group Co. to buy a stake in SkyBridge Capital LLC, the fund-management company founded by Anthony Scaramucci, who was briefly Trump’s White House communications director.

MoneyGram shares fell as much as 4.4 percent in after-market trading, while Lattice shares sank as much as 1.7 percent. Shares of Genworth Financial Inc., which has a $2.7 billion sale to China Oceanwide Holdings Group Co. pending U.S. approval, fell 2.7 percent.

Personally, I like this. People are so fond of saying Russia is not our friend, when Russia has the GDP of New York State and the economy of a colony–right down to the massive capital flight. Our real threat-competitor is China which has a quarter of the world’s population and an actual technological and industrial base. US companies are already forced to hand over intellectual property to China as a condition of doing business there. This is the flip side of that coin where the Chinese are buying US companies primarily for access to the patents and proprietorial processes that company owns.

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