Aren't many of the 4090 retail GPU's being built in China for foreign companies -- that are then supposed to be shipped out of the country? If a factory "overbuys" too many of the 4090 chips, then it would seem to be not too hard to just have a shadow inventory of chips that they just never end up using -- could easily be in the thousands for many suppliers without causing much suspicion due to the normal levels of stock they would need to have on hand for builds.

> As reported by Reuters, small batches of the semiconductors have slipped through the net [emphasis added]

So this is complete non-news, since not a single person with a brain (including the authors of the export ban) ever thought that it would be 100% effective. And it doesn't need to be in order to work.

I mean, North Korean elites drive the latest BMWs. That doesn't mean sanctions are irrelevant.