The New York Stock Exchange has been compelled to delist the stocks of China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom.

The move was announced on New Year’s Eve and was made to comply with Executive Order 13959, which makes some vague link between the trade of Chinese stocks and the funding of the Chinese military. In practice it’s just another front of US President Trump’s campaign to isolate China politically and economically.

“NYSE Regulation reached its decision that the Issuers are no longer suitable for listing pursuant to Listed Company Manual Section 802.01D in light of Executive Order 13959, which was signed on November 12, 2020,” said the NYSE announcement. “The Order prohibits, beginning 9:30 a.m. eastern standard time on January 11, 2021, any transaction in publicly traded securities, or any securities that are derivative of, or are designed to provide investment exposure to such securities, of any Communist Chinese military company, by any United States person.”

The irony of actions like this is that they bring the US closer to behaving in exactly the way it criticises China of. The main issue with Huawei and other Chinese telcos is that they are thought to be beholden to the Chinese state and will thus assist with its dastardly machinations. In order to defend itself from this threat, however, the US state is increasingly compelling domestic companies to do what it tells them.

China has stuck to the standard playbook in response by threatening ‘necessary countermeasures’, according to a dw.com report. This is the default response by the Chinese state to pretty much anything it doesn’t like. The past year has revealed it to be a global playground bully which has over played its hand such that its generic threats are largely discounted.