In brief: This week, Chinese authorities seized a shipment of XFX GPUs at a port on the border between Hong Kong and Shenzhen. It contained 5,840 GPUs that local media identified as mostly AMD Radeon RX 6700 XTs headed for XFX’s Chinese sales partners.
According to a report from Chinese customs, the shipment was seized after a routine inspection found three mislabelled GPUs inside. A subsequent investigation discovered that the company shipping them had declared them all with the wrong names and specifications.
Officials say the shipment’s value exceeds ¥20 million ($3.15 million).
Authorities did not mention XFX by name, but a video posted to Weibo on Saturday shows officials opening the shipment where the XFX logo is clearly seen. The Chinese company’s website is currently down, and Alibaba-run storefront Tmall has stopped listing its products. China-based online retailer JD continues to sell them.
Although owned by Hong Kong-based Pine Technology Holdings, XFX is headquartered in California. The hardware company’s operations outside of China have continued as normal.
It’s required to pay import taxes when shipping products to China, which might be what XFX was trying to avoid by mislabeling its GPUs. According to the Chinese outlet My Drivers, the practice is common among OEMs that ship to China.