Tencent video games interests not affected by Trump's executive order

News
By published

The owner of Riot Games and a significant portion of Epic Games is only being targeted for WeChat.

Valorant Agents
Valorant Agents (Image credit: Riot Games)

What you need to know

  • U.S. President Donald Trump has signed an executive order banning some Chinese companies from doing business with American companies.
  • The ban affects ByteDance, current owner of TikTok and Tencent's WeChat.
  • White House has confirmed that Tencent's video gaming interests including Riot Games and Epic Games are not affected.

The former is, of course, in talks with Microsoft over an acquisition deal, but the latter had a different kind of concern for gamers. With Trump going after Tencent, that potentially included a number of the most popular video games on the planet, including League of Legends, Valorant and Fortnite.

The White House has since clarified to the LA Times that video games, at least for now, are not affected.

Latest Videos From

"A White House official on Thursday night clarified that the executive order concerning WeChat only blocks transactions related to WeChat, not those involving other Tencent holdings."

So, for now at least, that's a blessing to players of all these games. Tencent has ownership of Riot Games, makers of League of Legends and Valorant, as well as a significant shareholding in Epic Games.

Richard Devine
Richard Devine
Managing Editor

Richard Devine is the Managing Editor at Windows Central, where he combines a deep love for the open-source community with expert-level technical coverage. Whether he’s hunting for the next big project on GitHub, fine-tuning a WSL workflow, or breaking down the latest meta in Call of Duty, Forza, and The Division 2, Richard focuses on making complex tech accessible to every kind of user. If it’s happening in the world of Windows or PC gaming, he’s probably already knee-deep in the code (or the lobbies). Follow him on X and Mastodon.