When SpaceX starts trading this week, one group will be noticeably absent from the frenzy: investors from China and Hong Kong. They are also likely to miss out on the upcoming initial public offering for OpenAI.
SpaceX, Elon Musk’s rocket maker and artificial intelligence company, has excluded investors in China and Hong Kong from participating in its I.P.O., according to five people with knowledge of the decision, who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
OpenAI, another leading A.I. company, is likely to impose the same restriction when it goes public this year, said three people with knowledge of the discussion. The company has already barred Chinese investors from participating in private fund-raising rounds, one of those people said.
The A.I. companies have not disclosed why they are hesitant to accept investments from the region, and it’s unclear whether the move is being made with input from the Trump administration. But Washington has been focused on keeping artificial intelligence out of China’s reach. Both companies count the U.S. government as major clients.
While Chinese investors have largely been shut out of private investments in sensitive sectors for years, this is most likely the first time investors in mainland China and Hong Kong have been excluded from a major American I.P.O., bankers in the region say.
It highlights how the United States and China have steadily scaled back trade, investment and collaboration — especially in sensitive sectors involving technology and science.
“The restrictions reflect a broader trend among American technology and A.I. companies, many of which have become increasingly reluctant to accept Chinese investment, driven by concerns over national security, intellectual property protection and data governance,” said Han Lin, a director for the Asia Group, a consulting firm, and a former senior Wells Fargo banker in China.
News that SpaceX would bar Chinese investors from its I.P.O. was reported earlier by Bloomberg.
As recently as last month, investors from mainland China and Hong Kong were allowed to participate in the blockbuster I.P.O. of Cerebras, an American maker of chips used to train artificial intelligence models.
But Washington and Beijing have been rapidly erecting barriers to trade and investment, complicating matters for investors and the banks that help facilitate cross-border deals.
Last week, China tightened restrictions on the flow of money out of the country and announced plans to screen companies seeking to expand overseas, blocking plans for companies deemed strategically important.
Several weeks earlier, the House Select Committee on China accused JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley of failing to conduct adequate due diligence when helping Chinese companies go public.
Staying on the right side of the U.S. government is especially important for SpaceX and OpenAI. It is SpaceX’s biggest customer, accounting for roughly $4 billion in revenue last year. This year, OpenAI announced that it would provide artificial intelligence technologies for the Defense Department’s classified systems.
China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, has used industrial policy to strengthen his country’s control over critical supply chains and industries, part of a broader push for self-reliance that Beijing views as a national security imperative. The policies have strengthened China’s dominance in global trade and heightened tensions with the United States.
During his first term, President Trump used tariffs and other measures to pressure companies to move manufacturing out of China. The Biden administration expanded those efforts, restricting U.S. investment in Chinese quantum computing, semiconductors and A.I. in an effort to slow China’s technological advances.
Washington also reviews foreign investments and acquisitions in sensitive sectors through the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. The Pentagon maintains a blacklist of companies that it says support China’s military, including major technology companies such as Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu, as well as the electric vehicle maker BYD.
China has responded by building its own web of export controls and investment restrictions, measures that American and European companies say have made it increasingly difficult to do business in China.
But any moves by SpaceX and OpenAI appear to be voluntary, said Aaron Bartnick, who was a White House tech policy official during the Biden administration.
“This is a very clear sign of not just the trade decoupling but also the technology and capital decoupling that is occurring between the U.S. and China,” he said.
Mr. Bartnick, who oversaw policy on CFIUS and outbound investment controls, said the decisions by leading technology companies could become a template for the industry. He said he would not be surprised if others followed suit, including Anthropic, which announced its plans to go public last week.
“It is tempting to label this an overreaction because it appears to be voluntary,” Mr. Bartnick said. “But a lot of American companies will look to companies like OpenAI, Anthropic and SpaceX as leaders.”
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