The U.S. will suspend the Bureau of Industry and Security's 50% rule, known as the Affiliates Rule, for one year starting Nov. 10, the White House said in a fact sheet released Nov. 1. The supension was negotiated during trade talks between U.S. and Chinese officials this past week.
The U.S. will suspend the Bureau of Industry and Security’s 50% rule for one year in exchange for Beijing postponing its export restrictions on rare earths for one year, the two sides announced Oct. 30.
The Trump administration has signaled that it may not waste time in enforcing the Bureau of Industry and Security’s new 50% rule, said Gavin Proudley, head of third-party risk proposition at Dow Jones, during the International Compliance Professionals Association's fall conference this week in Texas.
The U.S. is postponing the Bureau of Industry and Security's 50% rule for one year in exchange for Beijing delaying its rare earth export controls for one year, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in an Oct. 30 interview with Fox Business. "We are going to be suspending [the BIS 50% rule] for a year in return for the suspension on the rare earth licensing regime," he said.
More than 50 congressional Democrats, including Senate Banking Committee ranking member Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and House Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., urged the Trump administration Oct. 27 to reverse its recent decision to roll back a Biden-era interim final rule that increased restrictions on firearms exports.
It seems unlikely that the Bureau of Industry and Security could withdraw its new 50% rule either due to industry pushback or as part of trade negotiations with China, said Matt Axelrod, the former BIS export enforcement chief.
Aaron Amundson, a former longtime official with the Bureau of Industry and Security, has joined Latham & Watkins' economic sanctions and export controls practice, the law firm announced Oct. 27. Amundson spent nearly two decades with BIS, including most recently as acting director of the Office of National Security Controls and director of the Information Technology Controls Division.
The U.S. has removed its arms embargo on Cambodia because of the country's "diligent pursuit of peace and security," the State Department's Directorate of Defense Trade Controls announced Oct. 27.
A former State Department analyst on export control and sanctions evasion under President Joe Biden and a former National Security Council director for China under President George W. Bush agreed that the Bureau of Industry and Security's 50% rule was not fully thought through before its announcement.
The European Automobile Manufacturers Association said it's "deeply concerned" about potential disruptions to European vehicle manufacturing stemming from a trade dispute over Chinese-owned Dutch semiconductor firm Nexperia, especially "if the interruption of Nexperia chips supplies cannot be immediately resolved."