DeepSeek halts its second fundraising round after founder remarks on China-US AI gap go viral

The Chinese AI lab told prospective investors it is suspending a deal that targeted a pre-money valuation of roughly 480 billion yuan ($68 billion), following leaked comments attributed to its founder on China's dependence on Nvidia chips for compute. A first $7 billion round closed in June, and the company is separately preparing for an IPO on Shanghai's STAR Market.