Trump’s WeChat Assault Endangers $280 Billion Tencent Rally
- Tencent’s losing steam as investors ponder a WeChat ban
- Gaming and social media titan is the latest in Trump’s sights
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Donald Trump’s WeChat ban targets a celebrated Chinese innovation at the heart of the world’s largest mobile gaming and social media empire, threatening one of the more eye-catching stock rallies of 2020.
It’s hard to overstate WeChat’s importance to Tencent Holdings Ltd. It’s the means through which Tencent introduces a billion people to games and other online content, funneling trillions of dollars in annual payments to brands from Apple Inc. to Walmart Inc. WeChat’s reach underpinned Tencent’s $280 billion gain in market value since a March 18 Covid-19 trough -- equivalent to one Samsung Electronics Co. and the fifth biggest dollar-gain on the planet over that period.