The Trump administration is weighing whether to force Chinese tech conglomerate Tencent to abandon its investment in U.S. gaming companies, the Financial Times reports. That would include divesting major stakes in Fortnite maker Epic Games and League of Legends maker Riot Games. The threats leaked from the White House come ahead of negotiations with Xi Jinping in China next month.
Tencent currently holds a 28 percent stake in Epic Games as well as undisclosed investments in gaming-adjacent firms like Discord. It also owns Riot Games and has bought into gaming companies in other countries like Larian Studios and Remedy Entertainment. Supercell is based in Finland and makes Clash of Clans. Tencent has a majority stake in the mobile giant as well. The Trump administration is reportedly weighing options for potentially forcing Tencent to give up that holding as well because of the number of Supercell customers who are based in the U.S.
Tencent has been under review by the Treasury-led panel Cfius for years over concerns about the amount of user data its stakes in gaming companies might give it access to. Trump threatened to ban the social media platform WeChat, which Tencent owns, back near the end of his first term. One of the first things his administration did in its second term was designate the conglomerate a Chinese military company. The January 2025 policy shift was aimed at increasing pressure on China amid trade negotiations and led Tencent’s stock to plunge at the time.
It’s unclear if this latest debate within the White House is just more bluster or something Trump is committed to seeing through. The administration previously dragged its feet on Congressional legislation requiring it to shutdown TikTok in the United States. Instead, it engineered a deal to have Chinese tech firm ByteDance sell a controlling share in the short form video platform to a consortium of American-backed investors led by Oracle.
That tech company is led by Larry Ellison, whose nepo baby, David Ellison, is currently seizing control of Hollywood one legacy media company at a time. It’s a consolidation spree made possible thanks to Trump. What are the odds Tencent is forced to sell Riot Games to the growing Ellison empire as well?