alt Hacker NewsHas anyone figured out why Chinese billionaires are releasing these models? Do they hold short positions on US markets? Why would Xiaomi, et al. release these models in the first place? What is the strategic purpose here? I cannot believe for a second that they are doing it for human good.
Replies
Best leveraged debt on the US economy ever.
This really not that hard.
Deepseek started as Liang's side project funded with his hedgefund couch change compute. That set the economics for everyone else in PRC. If deepseek releases for free because Liang doesn't give a shit about making $$$ on his hobby, every other PRC player has to follow. And serendipitously, due to US export controls, PRC tech companies can't dig themselves into ruinous seppuku debt buying compute even if they wanted to - what they can buy, i.e. everything around DC infra including power, they get for fraction of the cost expediently.
TLDR Liang said fuck profits... which means every other PRC competitor had to fuck profits, which ends up fucking profits of western labs so deep in debt due to rampant financialization and can not afford to say fuck profits.
Sometimes a billionaire is fine just burning $$$ on a hobby while remaining a billionaire instead of trillionaire, and it just so happens the side effect might mean preventing others from being trillionaires as well. Bonus others is geopolitical adversary who is hedging economy on trillion $$$ returns.
One very simple reason could be that the US has been very vocal about China being its geopolitical adversary (they may be right).