Bessent says several agencies wanted Megaspeed blacklisted for months but ‘Commerce has the pen’

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a Friday interview that his department and others had agreed on placing Megaspeed on a special list of companies that pose national security concerns, but that the Commerce Department “has the pen”⁶.

Bessent said several government agencies “were in favour of putting Megaspeed on the entity list for months”⁸. He was asked in a television interview why Megaspeed, a Singaporean company, had not been restricted¹.

He blamed the Commerce Department, run by Howard Lutnick, for failing to properly oversee exports². He also described “a lot of leakage” of Nvidia chips to China⁴.

Earlier this week, Bessent was reported to have confronted Lutnick over the failure to put Megaspeed on the list⁹.

Bessent’s comments put on the record a dispute that had until now been described mainly through accounts of private meetings^7,9. He said the Treasury had wanted to blacklist the company for months, pointing a finger at Lutnick⁷.

Why it matters to investors

Bessent did not deny reports of tension between him and Lutnick, who has come under scrutiny for his inaction over Megaspeed⁶. The Singapore company has been accused of illegally diverting US chips to China⁶.

The dispute is tied to the scandal that ended Jensen Huang’s tenure at Nvidia. Huang admitted he had an affair with an executive from Megaspeed, and the US has identified the woman, Alice Huang, as a suspected Chinese intelligence asset⁶.

Lutnick has frequently clashed with other officials in recent months over technology exports, which his department oversees³. Criticism of his role in overseeing export controls on US chips to China is growing⁵.

The Treasury Secretary’s decision to make the dispute public marks a shift from private disagreement to an open split inside the cabinet over how strictly to police sales of American AI chips^1,7. For chipmakers and their customers, the outcome bears on how quickly the government adds companies suspected of diverting chips to its restricted list^5,8.

What to watch

The Commerce Department’s response to Bessent’s account, and whether it moves to list Megaspeed, are the next tests^4,6. Pressure on Lutnick is growing in the fallout from the Nvidia scandal⁸.

Further reporting on which agencies backed a listing and when they did so would clarify how long the recommendation sat with Commerce^7,8.