This is economic war. China now is taking over the car economy from Japan, Europe and USA. And I believe they have ambitious on semiconductor as well. The world has demand on high end chips also require cheap chips which does the job.
I am not fully persuaded there is shortage. People could not get what they want is more about price not availability. That because manufacturers made too many things customers don’t need. Base on Q4 IC companies report, most of product driven companies, like Intel and AMD sales less than last year. However OEM like TMSC actually produces more and had more revenue.
There were multiple protests happened last week to memory people burnt to death because the inappropriate lock down of building. People release anger against the inhuman lock down policy. The definitely need hide as much evidence as possible.