Bessent said he was “frustrated” by delays in putting the company on the export control list and reports of leakage of AI chips into China.

“President Trump made it very clear that China should not receive any Nvidia chips above H100s, so any leakage is very frustrating because it hurts our great companies in the AI race, because it gives the Chinese an advantage,” he said.

Last year, the Commerce Department had been investigating Megaspeed over suspicions it had been smuggling some of Nvidia’s advanced AI chips into China, according to the New York Times. Megaspeed has been contacted for comment.

There was also pressure on the Commerce Department to add it to the list, but separate reporting in the Financial Times said the department was delaying efforts to have the cloud computing firm included.

However, Bessent also pointed the finger at Nvidia.

“The story has been thus far of Jensen Huang’s personal foibles,” he told CNBC’s Squawk Box programme, external.

“The real story here should be: Did Nvidia know their client, and was there a robust effort at Nvidia to make sure that there was no leakage and that they were selling to what were obviously pass-through shell companies?

“It’s important that anyone at the company there be held accountable for that.”

Bessent’s pointed comments are a rare instance of internal debate within the Trump administration spilling out into the public view, although tensions have reportedly simmered between Bessent and Lutnick in the past.

In 2024, the two reportedly jostled for the role of treasury secretary ahead of Trump’s return to the White House, and last year the pair butted heads over the administration’s tariff policy, accoprding to US media.