Chinese customs officials are now sitting on a pile of PC graphics cards after confiscating three crates of them, some of which contain GPUs from US vendor XFX.
The shipments were seized in the Chinese city of Shenzhen, which borders Hong Kong, after officials there noticed that the original labels on the boxes had been covered up with new labels, according to Chinese media outlet MyDrivers.
Chinese customs then discovered the actual products inside the crates were inconsistent with the specifications and product models declared on the import duties form.
“After identification, the actual specifications and models of 5,840 graphics cards did not match the declaration, and the value of the goods exceeded 20 million yuan ($3.1 million),” Chinese customs announced on social media last week.
Chinese officials also uploaded a video showing the crates being inspected. The clip reveals at least some of the GPUs inside came from the vendor XFX, which sells AMD PC graphics cards. One picture in particular shows what appears to be a seized Radeon RX 6700 XT GPU.
Whether the shipments contained GPUs from other vendors is unclear. Chinese customs officials said only that they seized the crates from an unnamed company.
Although there are a lot unknowns about the shipments, the alleged mislabeling suggests someone was trying to smuggle GPUs into the country at lower import duties, and then sell them to local customers. PC graphics cards from both AMD and Nvidia continue to be in short supply at regular prices. So the shipment of GPUs may have found plenty of buyers in China.
What will happen to the confiscated graphics card is also unknown. But the seizure occurs as China has implemented strict rules to outlaw cryptocurrency mining in the country.
XFX did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
