Chinese brands are scarce on Washington’s streets, so are the CEOs in Trump-Xi summit

• Chinese consumer brands were largely absent from Washington, highlighting limited Chinese business presence in the US capital.
• Xi Jinping's visit focused mainly on political issues, with no accompanying Chinese business delegation, contrasting with Trump's earlier Beijing visit with many US executives.
• US restrictions and tensions create investment challenges, causing cautious attitudes towards Chinese products despite their growing global influence and consumer use in the US.

WASHINGTON – On the streets of the US capital, signs of China’s growing consumer clout can be surprisingly hard to find.

There are no BYD electric cars cruising down Pennsylvania Avenue; instead, Japanese auto brands Honda, Toyota and Subaru are a far more common sight. Huawei or Xiaomi phones, two major Chinese tech brands, are not spotted in people’s hands. And Chinese chains such as Luckin Coffee and Haidilao hotpot that have opened in other US cities have no presence in Washington.

What is easily recognisable in Washington, however, is Pop Mart, the Beijing-founded toy company behind the popular Labubu figurines. But even its nearest store is across the Potomac River in Arlington, Virginia, where it opened in 2025, although another store is slated to open in the District in Georgetown.

Meanwhile, boba fans will have to venture even farther afield to Rockville, Maryland, a suburb with a sizeable Asian-American population northwest of Washington, for a sip of China’s new-style teas from Molly Tea and Heytea.

The relative absence is striking at a time when Chinese consumer brands from electric cars and smartphones to collectible toys and fashion brands are expanding rapidly in markets elsewhere around the world.

And on Sept 24, that absence extended all the way to the White House.

At a state dinner held by US President Donald Trump in honour of Chinese President Xi Jinping, the guest list featured a who’s who of corporate America.

Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, Advanced Micro Devices’ Lisa Su, Apple’s Tim Cook and Tesla’s Elon Musk sat at the same table with Trump, Xi and their spouses.

According to the official White House dinner guest list, only 19 of the 134 are from the Chinese side, which includes Xi and other top officials such as Xi’s chief of staff Cai Qi, Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Commerce Minister Wang Wentao, Vice-Premier He Lifeng and China’s ambassador to the US Xie Feng.

Xi had arrived in Washington on Sept 23 without a business delegation, despite rumours of plans being drawn up as recently as a week before his visit for Chinese executives from some of China’s biggest companies to accompany him.

Reuters had previously reported that representatives from electric car giant BYD, smartphone company Xiaomi, battery makers CATL and Gotion, consumer electronics manufacturer Hisense, automotive parts company Wanxiang, state-owned Bank of China, and agricultural conglomerate COFCO Group were among those under consideration.

In contrast, when Trump visited Beijing in May, more than a dozen US business leaders including Musk, Cook, Huang, Citigroup’s Jane Fraser, Goldman Sachs’ David Solomon and Boeing’s Kelly Ortberg came along. Several went on to meet with senior Chinese officials and regulators on their own after the presidential summit.

Who’s not there: Does it matter?

The absence of Chinese business titans on Xi’s trip to Washington should not be overinterpreted, said Zhang Yun, an international relations professor at Nanjing University.

He said that Xi’s unusually tight three-day itinerary, confined to Washington, meant that the visit was primarily focused on political and strategic issues, while business engagement could potentially be left for another occasion.

He pointed to Xi’s first state visit in 2015, where 15 Chinese business honchos including Alibaba’s Jack Ma, Tencent’s Pony Ma, Baidu’s Robin Li and Lenovo’s Yang Yuanqing attended a US-China business roundtable in Seattle. The business leaders did not follow Xi on the Washington leg of his visit to meet then-President Barack Obama.

One opportunity for China and the US to talk business could come as soon as the APEC summit in Shenzhen in November, where Xi and Trump could meet again, said Zhang.

“After all, Shenzhen is a window into China’s reform and opening up and its new and high-technology industries”, he added.

George Chen, a partner and co-chair of digital practice at The Asia Group, similarly cautioned against interpreting the lopsided corporate turnout as a barometer of the summit’s success, as their absence carries little bearing.

For Trump, assembling some of America’s biggest technology executives serves to showcase US competitiveness and innovation, particularly in artificial intelligence (AI).

But for Xi, having a matching contingent of Chinese executives was “nice to have, but not necessary”, he added.

“For the Chinese political system, it’s always about the party, about the ruler, rather than about how much influence the business community can have,” Chen said, pointing also to Beijing’s previous crackdown on its technology sector and what he described as the government’s “mixed relationship” with the industry.

Nanjing University’s Zhang said the more consequential issue was not whether Chinese executives were seated at the White House dinner but the difficult environment for investment between the world’s two largest economies.

“This is particularly the case with Chinese investment in the US, which faces all kinds of US restrictions, including those imposed on national security grounds and security reviews, which have created many difficulties and obstacles for Chinese investment,” Zhang said.

Huawei has, for years, faced sweeping US restrictions on its telecommunications equipment and access to American technology, while Chinese battery giants CATL and Gotion have come under scrutiny in Washington over national security and alleged military links.

Meanwhile, Chinese automaker BYD has effectively been shut out of the US passenger EV market by steep tariffs and other restrictions on Chinese-made vehicles and technology.

While Trump has said that he welcomes Chinese investment, Zhang said: “Rhetoric is not the same as institutionalised arrangements.”

“That is why interaction between the Chinese and US presidents is important in providing a more predictable environment and greater certainty for businesses on both sides to invest in each other’s countries.”

Beyond government policies, uncertainty over economic ties with China can also be felt at the consumer level.

Near the White House, a 24-year-old US federal worker, who declined to give her name as she works for the government, described her relationship with Chinese technology as one of “keeping a safe distance”.

“There’s that inherent worry of data leakage and privacy infringement, especially on platforms where you have to input your financial details,” she said, explaining why she deliberately stays away from platforms such as Temu and Shein, both popular online shopping sites.

However, TikTok, her social media of choice, proved harder to give up.

When the app briefly went offline in the US in January 2025, she switched to Instagram Reels and initially stayed away even after TikTok returned. But she eventually went back.

“Regardless of whether Americans want to or not, so many of the products we use without realising it are of Chinese origin,” she said.

“So I think it’s more just a matter of practicality than it is a matter of principle.”