The U.S. should boost efforts to counter China’s unfair trading practices and work closer with allies on trade restrictions, said Janet Yellen, President Joe Biden’s nominee for treasury secretary. The new administration will increase pressure and work multilaterally against China’s unfair subsidies, illegal technology transfers and other trade issues, Yellen told the Senate Finance Committee virtually in her confirmation hearing Tuesday. “China is clearly our most important strategic competitor,” she said, and the U.S. needs to “take on" China's "abusive, unfair and illegal practices,” including illegal dumping, trade barriers, lopsided subsidies and forced technology transfers, which are giving it an “unfair technological advantage.” If confirmed, Yellen said, Treasury will cooperate more with allies but will impose unilateral restrictions if they are warranted. “These practices, including China's global labor and environmental standards, are practices that we’re prepared to use the full array of tools to address,” she said.

China will “sanction” 28 former Trump administration officials, including ex-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, for “their selfish political interests and prejudice and hatred against China,” said the Foreign Affairs Ministry Wednesday, hours before Joe Biden took the oath of office to become the 46th U.S. president. It also listed former National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien and former Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, but not former President Donald Trump. The dignitaries are “prohibited” from entering China, Hong Kong and Macao, “and companies and institutions associated with them are also restricted from doing business with China,” said the ministry. It blasted the officials for having “executed a series of crazy moves which have gravely interfered in China's internal affairs, undermined China's interests, offended the Chinese people, and seriously disrupted China-U.S. relations.” Efforts to reach the officials for comment were unsuccessful.

The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security is experiencing significant delays to its Huawei licensing decisions due to low-productivity telework protocols in place for the COVID-19 pandemic, said Eileen Albanese, director of the bureau's Office of National Security and Technology Transfer Controls, at a Massachusetts Export Center virtual event Friday. Communications between agencies have been hampered, she said, causing lengthy adjudications and a backlog of applications for licenses to sell to Huawei (see 2009300018). “COVID-19 really did have a significant impact on Huawei licenses, more so than any other group of licenses,” said Albanese. She blamed the delays on lengthy, virtual interagency meetings and difficulties in remotely accessing licensing platforms. “We still have a bunch that we have to go through,” she said of the backlog. Kevin Wolf, an export controls lawyer with Akin Gump, told the event his clients have had applications “pending for months and months and months,” including some dating to 2019.

Commerce Department rules for reviewing transactions involving some foreign telecom and IT products and services would cost all 4.5 million firms possibly affected as much as $20 billion, the department says in Tuesday's Federal Register. The rule allows Commerce to step in to review any proposed, ongoing or pending ITCS goods or services transaction. The rule provides for an optional "licensing" process whereby companies can request a review of their transaction and, if approved, get safe harbor. Procedures for the licenses will be published by Commerce in 60 days, the rule said. Included in the new supply chain rules are information or communications technology used in a critical infrastructure; software, hardware and services integral to wireless local area networks, mobile networks, satellite payloads and operations and control; software or hardware that has sensitive personal data on more than 1 million U.S. customers; and software designed for communicating via the Internet used by more than that number.

China is “firmly opposed” to the Trump administration’s decision Thursday to add smartphone maker Xiaomi to a list of “Communist Chinese military companies” for new export restrictions, said a Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Friday. “What the U.S. side has done goes against the trend of history” and “violates the principles of market competition and international economic and trade rules,” he said. “China will take necessary measures to resolutely safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies and support them in defending their own rights and interests in accordance with law.”

The Biden administration should prioritize addressing the threat of international discriminatory taxes against U.S. companies, the Computer & Communications Industry Association said Thursday. CCIA noted that the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative released reports in its Section 301 investigations into digital services taxes, concluding that DSTs in the U.K., Spain and Austria are “discriminatory against U.S. tech firms.” CCIA President Matt Schruers said: “Absent a proportionate response, U.S. exports will be unfairly singled out in other countries. Moreover, the proliferation of unilateral national taxes undermines the crucial work being done by the community of nations at the [Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development], and risks the ability of negotiators to achieve consensus.”

TCL increased Q4 TV seaborne imports to the U.S. by 106% from a year earlier, while Element’s imports increased 252%, reported S&P Global Wednesday. Imports “linked” to Samsung rose by 55%, “indicating all three companies managed to scale up production in response to pandemic-related demand,” it said. “There was already an apparent surge in shipments of televisions in 2020 due to pandemic-related stay-at-home and entertainment substitute spending.” Element has made a big play of promoting LCD TV assembly in South Carolina for supplying to Walmart but also sources panels and finished sets from China. TCL and Element didn’t comment.

The FCC's new rules setting a list of covered communications equipment and services determined to be a national security risk take effect March 15, says Wednesday's Federal Register. Eligible telecom carriers that receive USF funds must remove such equipment or services, and all providers of advanced communications services must report whether their networks include any covered equipment acquired after Aug. 14, 2018. The rules also establish the Secure and Trusted Communications Network reimbursement program, which gives smaller providers funds to "rip and replace" such equipment (see 2011190059).

The U.S. was on track through November for record imports in 2020, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, reported the National Retail Federation Friday. U.S. retail ports handled 2.11 million 20-foot containers or their equivalents in November, increasing 24.5% from the 2019 month but down 4.9% from October, said NRF. December was projected at 2.02 million containers, down 17.3% year on the year but one of only six times in nearly 20 years that the monthly total has reached 2 million, it said. If the December projection holds up, 2020 will have ended with 21.9 million containers handled, up 1.5% from 2019 and breaking the previous record of 21.8 million containers in 2018. Imports during the second half of 2020 set a “string of new records,” including an all-time high of 8.3 million containers handled for the July-October “peak season” when retailers rushed to bring in merchandise for Q4 holiday selling season, said NRF.

The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security renewed its temporary export control on certain artificial intelligence software, extending it a year from Jan. 6, said that day's Federal Register. BIS originally added the software to temporary controls under export administration regulations because it intended to propose it for multilateral control for the 2020 Wassenaar Arrangement. But Wassenaar’s annual plenary wasn't held last year due to COVID-19. BIS said the extension helps the U.S. “continue its effort at the Wassenaar Arrangement in 2021.”