also, it's very much possible that the chinese companies get heavy investments from the state. Since it's very hard to get this info we have no idea wether they really make a profit or not.

I agree, and find that very plausible. I mean, for the CCP a few billions to subsidize domestic AI companies is a tiny investment with a potential huge payoff. It prevents (or at least make it harder for) US companies to build a monopoly on LLM tech and it could help popping the bubble which would weaken the US economy. In fact, if I remember correctly, the AI infrastructure build-out is what is keeping the US from a technical recession.

The R&D is of course subsidized but a lot/most(?) of these inference providers are not Chinese