Rep. Ritchie Torres Writes in the Washington Post with Former Biden Deputy Commerce Secretary Graves on Chinese Exploitation in U.S. Financial Markets

Resources / In the News Share on Rep. Ritchie Torres Writes in the Washington Post with Former Biden Deputy Commerce Secretary Graves on Chinese Exploitation in U.S. Financial Markets Jun 29, 2026 In the News WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Congressman Ritchie Torres (NY-15) published an op-ed in The Washington Post, co-authored with former Biden Deputy Commerce Secretary Don Graves , warning that Chinese-linked fintech platforms are exploiting access to U.S. capital markets for data collection, economic espionage, and intelligence gathering on American investors. Rep. Torres serves on the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party and the House Committee on Financial Services. Rep. Torres and former Deputy Sec. Graves argue that these platforms have been licensed as broker-dealers without the scrutiny that their national security risk demands, collecting Social Security numbers and building detailed financial profiles on Americans that Beijing can compel firms to hand over under PRC law. The authors point to a 2025 SEC disclosure showing one such company had 61 percent of its employees operating inside mainland China, working for a subsidiary whose government grants required supporting CCP leadership, conduct that drew a $500,000 fine from Massachusetts regulators and a $3 million fine from FINRA. They call on the SEC to impose transparency and security standards on Chinese-linked broker-dealers, and on Congress to follow with hearings and legislation closing the oversight gaps. The full piece reads: Tens of millions of Americans trust U.S. financial institutions with their life savings. People give these platforms their most sensitive data and rely on them to save for a home, build a college fund or prepare for retirement. But these institutions are being exploited by the People’s Republic of China. The PRC wields U.S. market access as a weapon: a tool for capital theft, intelligence collection and economic espionage operating at scale. Beijing seeks to embed itself in the digital underpinnings of American life, like connected hardware in homes and fintech platforms carrying sensitive financial data. Trust in U.S. public markets, developed over two centuries, depends on transparency and the rule of law. Technology has democratized investing, but a critical gap has emerged. Chinese-born fintech platforms have been licensed to operate as broker-dealers — the gatekeepers of U.S. capital markets — without the necessary level of scrutiny. These platforms collect Social Security numbers, track transaction patterns, monitor money movements and build detailed profiles of investors’ financial behavior. Under PRC law, Beijing can compel any company subject to its jurisdiction to hand over data to the regime’s security officials. Do Americans really want Chinese Communist Party-connected firms holding the keys to their savings? At the core of several of these platforms lies a deeper layer of technological infrastructure — algorithms and data architecture shaped within China’s regulatory system. Entering U.S. markets through acquisitions, shell-company transactions, direct licensing and public listings, they carry embedded assumptions about control, compliance and state access that regulators are only now beginning to confront. Consider the teamster in the Bronx or the defense engineer outside Cleveland. If they go home and trade on one of these platforms, they could be flying blind. Neither of them may know that their chosen app’s investors have backed Chinese competitors in the industries they work in or that their financial data may flow to servers beyond the reach of American regulators. It is a structural problem hiding in plain sight. TikTok gave us a preview of exactly this dynamic: a consumer-facing platform with deep ties to Beijing and no data firewall American regulators could independently verify. Congress and multiple administrations acted on that threat with bipartisan divestiture legislation. Policymakers must act similarly now before they are forced to have that debate at far greater cost. There is a paradox at the heart of the U.S. competition with China. America’s greatest advantage is the rule of law — the predictable, transparent system of standards that has made U.S. financial markets the most robust on the planet. China’s advantage is the opposite: an opaque system of state direction and selective enforcement that no U.S. regulator is able to review with proper scrutiny. The Securities and Exchange Commission’s own Division of Corporation Finance has warned that PRC restrictions materially limit the commission’s ability to obtain the information necessary to protect investors. American firms play by the rules while their rivals exploit the gap. This is not a hypothetical threat. One company’s 2025 SEC disclosure confirmed that 61 percent of its employees operated within mainland China, working for a subsidiary receiving government grants t