BEIJING (dpa-AFX) - China's National Press and Publication Administration (NPPA) website quietly retracted its page featuring the proposed online gaming restrictions as of Tuesday morning.
Following the news, the shares of online gaming companies such as Tencent Holdings (TCEHY) and NetEase (NTES) surged in the stock market.
In December, China proposed some regulations to curb obsessive gaming by limiting in-game purchases and daily log-in rewards.
The proposed regulations wiped off approximately $80 billion in terms of market value from two leading Chinese online gaming companies in Shanghai, Hong Kong and New York.
However, after witnessing the repercussions of the announcement, the NPPA announced that it would make amendments to the draft after carefully studying the public feedback on the proposed rules. It also emphasized that the regulations were meant to promote 'healthy development' of the gaming industry.
Later, a key official of the Communist Party's Propaganda Department was removed over poorly handling the release of the online gaming rules draft.
The country's biggest crackdown on online gaming came in 2021 when the government banned children from playing online games for more than a stipulated time on certain days. It also stopped granting gaming licenses for eight months.
China approved a total of 105 new video games in December last year.
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