Shares of multiple Chinese artificial intelligence developers and technology firms dropped notably after The Information and Bloomberg reported that Chinese authorities had opened data-security investigations into the startups DeepSeek and Moonshot AI.
According to The Information, Hong Kong-listed Z.AI fell 7.4 percent and MiniMax Group slid 6.3 percent. Alibaba, which is developing its own Qwen model, closed down about 4.2 percent. The reports say the investigations followed allegations by Anthropic that DeepSeek and Moonshot AI transmitted sensitive data via Anthropic’s Claude models.
The news dented market sentiment more broadly and pulled down stocks of other companies with proprietary AI models: Xiaomi and Tencent each saw their shares decline by roughly 2.5 percent.
Investors are increasingly concerned that Beijing may tighten oversight of the AI sector. Leonyid Mironov, a portfolio manager at Gavekal Capital, said investors fear further regulatory tightening and noted that the precise contours of any new rules are currently unknown — a factor that could slow development of Chinese AI models.
Sentiment is also being influenced by geopolitical timing: the forthcoming summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Hszi Csin-ping is expected to include discussions of AI-sector regulation, adding another source of uncertainty for markets.
Notes:
- This article is not investment advice.
- An AI assistant contributed to preparing the text; the final content was edited and verified by a journalist.
