"(presumably out of legal advice)"

Uh, no. You can't presume that. There is absolutely no reason to bother denying the story if the report is a fabrication (and an incompetently disseminated one at that), a smear campaign, or anything related to a foreign misinformation operation (the story of how the 'laptop' ended up in Giuliani's makes absolutely no sense and it's insulting to anyone's intelligence to think that anyone would believe it). The lack of response from Biden to it is indicative of absolutely nothing, and to take it as a sign of guilt is extremely disingenuous. The idea that the media in the US covers for the CCP is completely unqualified, too.