SCALE Act

On April 15, 2026, Rep. Moolenaar (R-MI) introduced HR8306, the SCALE Act, which requires the Secretary of Commerce and Director of National Intelligence to establish objective performance metrics for AI hardware in entities of concern and set annual export control thresholds accordingly. The bill has been referred to the House Foreign Affairs and Intelligence Committees—early stage with no committee action yet.

The bill authorizes zero funding. It is a policy mandate that codifies existing export control regimes into a systematic annual process. No new money is allocated; the mechanism is regulatory, not fiscal. The operational costs for Commerce and ODNI to establish metrics and run annual reviews are absorbed within existing agency budgets.

Structural winners and losers: The bill is neutral for domestic AI infrastructure companies ($MSFT, $GOOGL, $AMZN) that build their own AI hardware—they are already largely shielded from China exposure. The bull case for domestic ecosystem is that predictable controls reduce supply chain whipsaws. Primary losers are companies with significant direct or indirect China revenue from AI chips: $NVDA (Data Center China sales capped), $AMD (Instinct MI accelerator China ambitions limited), and $SMCI (China-destined AI server builds constrained).

Real market data: NVDA at $200.67 is down 6.6% from its April 28 high of $213.17 but up 15.1% over 30 days. The stock trades near the top of its 52-week range ($110.82–$216.83). AMD at $349.37 has surged 71.7% over 30 days and is essentially at its 52-week high of $352.99—the SCALE Act's bearish implications for China exposure are not reflected in AMD's recent momentum. SMCI at $27.25 is down 6.3% over 7 days and trades near the lower half of its $19.48–$62.36 52-week range. INTC at $94.44 has rallied 114% over 30 days—as a US-centric foundry and PC/enterprise CPU maker, it is largely unaffected by China chip export restrictions.

Timeline: The bill was introduced 15 days ago and is in early committee stage. It requires hearings in Foreign Affairs and Intelligence committees, a markup, floor vote in the House, companion introduction in the Senate (none yet), Senate committee action, Senate floor vote, conference committee if different versions, then presidential signature. Given the single Republican sponsor and broad bipartisan agreement on China chip export controls, the bill has moderate passage probability in this Congress, but actual implementation (annual metrics) would begin 180 days after enactment.