The president of the United States has issued an executive order to block any transaction related to Tencent’s WeChat.
The restrictions against TikTok and WeChat will not directly affect Tencent Games as a video game developer, despite the fact that the Chinese giant owns one of these applications. Donald Trump, president of the United States, announced that he had presented two executive orders to prevent any transaction carried out through these applications. However, at least for the moment, this offensive will not affect any of the gaming divisions, nor Riot Games or Epic Games Store, companies in which Tencent has a stake.
The US Government has carried out these maneuvers in a belligerent context between the North American country and China. Since the coronavirus crisis hatched, the approach immortalized in an agreement signed by Donald Trump and Xi Jinping seems to have fallen on deaf ears, with a verbal escalation threatening to bring the trade war back. It is a problem with many edges that does not seem to have a close solution, not even with a hypothetical change of direction in the White House if Joe Biden, a Democratic candidate, manages to beat the current president in the November elections.
Video game companies owned by Tencent will NOT be affected by this executive order!
White House official confirmed to the LA Times that the EO only blocks transactions related to WeChat
So Riot Games (League of Legends), Epic Games (Fortnite), et al are safe
(pending updates)
– Sam Dean 🦅 (@SamAugustDean) August 7, 2020
Trump’s arguments
“To protect our nation, I took steps to address the threat posed by a mobile application, TikTok. Subsequent measures are necessary to face a similar threat, “said the president in a statement collected by our colleagues from Cinco Días. In the same article, they explain that the measures taken against WeChat have caused Tencent to fall on the Chinese Stock Exchange, with losses of 10%.
The commander-in-chief of the United States, for his part, even threatened to close TikTok if they did not sell their company to a North American company before September. Microsoft is negotiating its acquisition, but there is still no agreement. In keeping with Trump’s narrative, the app collects user data. “This data collection threatens to give the Chinese Communist Party access to the personal and property data of Americans, potentially allowing China to track down the locations of federal employees and contractors, build personnel information files to blackmail, and conduct corporate espionage.” , he asserted.
Source | PC Gamer
