By LU Keyan
A US judge Tuesday ruled that Chinese telecommunication the probation of equipment maker ZTE should be ended. The company was put on probation in 2017 for illegally shipping US technology to DPRK and Iran.
Trading in shares of ZTE paused briefly in advance of the ruling and surged on Wednesday afternoon when resumed in Shenzhen and Hong Kong.
As part of the 2017 plea deal, ZTE paid US$892 million (5.7 billion yuan) and sacked four senior executives. Then the US department of commerce accused ZTE in 2018 of a further conspiracy to commit visa fraud and prohibited all American companies from selling components to ZTE for seven years.
ZTE was crippled by the ban. At the time, ZTE accounted for roughly 10 percent of the global telecommunication equipment market. The company paid a US billion fine as part of the deal to lift the ban.
On March 14, at a hearing in Dallas on the fraud accusation, ZTE argued that it had already been fined the maximum and the director concerned had left the company in 2019. The judge said ZTE was responsible for what the former director had done but decided to take no further action.
