Tencent Denies It Faces Chinese Regulatory Restrictions

Tencent has said it isn’t facing a major regulatory crackdown, refuting online speculation, according to a Monday (Feb. 21) report from Bloomberg.

The company issued an “unusually aggressive” response to said speculation, with Zhang Jun, its head of public relations, saying nothing was going on.

“Ask me next time, at least that’s more legit. And I’m not afraid of going on record,” Zhang said on his semi-public WeChat feed, per Bloomberg.

According to the report, Zhang was poking fun at a post citing an anonymous employee of Tencent, which, before its removal, had been shared a lot on social media.

The post also hinted at another big step in the regulatory crackdown against the internet, with new rules possibly being put in place regarding violence in video games, player spending and concepts like anime and religion.

A screenshot of the alleged new gaming curbs caused a ruckus on the internet. Wang Guanran, an analyst with Citic Securities, clarified that he originally posted the content last year, but he hadn’t posted anything that day.

Chinese tech shares have seen a precipitous drop over fears that Beijing might debut new restrictions for the private enterprise. Traders were pointing to everything from regulatory warnings about metaverse scams to gaming industry restrictions. The report noted that Tencent is a leader in the metaverse development.

Tencent, along with fellow companies ByteDance and Alibaba, have been investing in the metaverse, PYMNTS wrote – even as China’s government has been skeptical of jumping in too much like U.S. companies are.

See also: ByteDance, Tencent, Alibaba Invest in China’s Regulated Metaverse

China’s total addressable market for the metaverse is around 52 trillion yuan, or $8 trillion, per a Morgan Stanley report. In China, as the metaverse rolls out more, censorship is likely to be a factor in the country.

A challenge for the metaverse there could be finding ways to get younger users interested, which could come down to various popular games or other features offered in the metaverse there.