NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 5090 GPU shipments have reportedly been spotted in China, despite ongoing export restrictions aimed at limiting such occurrences. This suggests that China might have found ways to bypass these trade barriers, as the GPUs continue to arrive in substantial quantities. The discovery has sparked discussions about how these products are reaching Chinese shores.
NVIDIA RTX 5090’s Mysterious Journey to China
Over the past months, the flow of banned hardware into China has been a hot topic, especially with the US tightening export controls. However, recent reports suggest the situation remains unchanged. A post on PCMR Reddit claims that large shipments of NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 5090s have been spotted in China. These GPUs, bearing MSI and Gigabyte marks, lack the “v2” label, which is the variant allowed for export to China.
Reddit users debate that while the GPUs are not banned in China, US companies cannot directly export them. China reportedly circumvents this by acquiring the GPUs from countries outside the direct reach of US restrictions, with Malaysia and Singapore being key locations. Additionally, Chinese AI companies are said to exploit the ‘rental compute’ loophole to secure the necessary hardware for their operations.
GPU Scarcity and Rising Prices
Most of these RTX 5090 GPUs are likely being allocated for AI tasks, as their high VRAM capacity is ideal for such applications. In response to the ongoing AI boom, China is reportedly converting consumer GPUs into AI-specific formats by enhancing their VRAM and altering their design. As a result, gamers in China, like their counterparts globally, face increasing difficulties in acquiring GPUs due to high demand from the AI sector.
NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 5090 is already experiencing heavy shortages, with prices expected to rise to as much as $5,000 in the future, and it is disappointing to say that for PC gamers, gaining access to units has become impossible in today’s market.