WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump prolonged the deadline for TikTok to secure a purchaser who isn’t from China before facing a prohibition within the country. This extension provides an additional 75-day window for them to resolve this matter.
"Our administration has been putting in significant effort to secure a deal for TikTok, and we've achieved remarkable progress," Trump stated on Truth Social, mere hours before the deadline was set to lapse.
Completing a transaction involves considerable effort to secure all required approvals. Therefore, I am issuing an Executive Order to maintain TikTok’s operations for another 75 days.
The widely used video-sharing application, boasting over 170 million users in America, now faces potential shutdown due to a new U.S. legislation enacted last year. This law mandates that TikTok must separate from its parent company, ByteDance of China, failing which it will be forced to close operations within the United States.
Trump has insisted his administration is near a deal to find a buyer for TikTok and keep it from shutting down that would involve multiple investors, but has given few details.
ByteDance confirmed ongoing discussions with the U.S. government to find a resolution but emphasized that several important issues still needed addressing.
"A contract has not been signed," and anything agreed upon will require "approval according to Chinese law," the firm further stated.
Driven by concerns over national safety and the belief in Washington that TikTok is under the control of the Chinese government, the prohibition came into force on January 19. This was just a day prior to Trump’s inaugural ceremony, and during this time, ByteDance did not make an effort to seek out potential buyers.
TikTok briefly went offline in the United States and was removed from app stores, much to the disappointment of countless users.
However, the GOP president swiftly declared a preliminary 75-day extension, which led to TikTok being reinstated for users. It then returned to both the Apple and Google app stores in February.
The revised 75-day extension moves the due date to June 19.
Trump has consistently minimized the threats facing TikTok, asserting his belief that a purchaser for the app’s operations in the U.S. will be found.
On Friday, the president also stated that he plans to "keep cooperating sincerely with China." The Chinese government must approve this deal.
The president proposed that TikTok might be included in an extensive agreement with China to alleviate the harsh tariffs he implemented against Beijing as part of a global surge in taxes.
"We aim to prevent TikTok from going offline. We anticipate collaborating with TikTok and China to finalize the agreement," he stated additionally.
As per reports, the proposed plan involves current American investors in ByteDance maintaining their holdings as part of a newly established standalone international TikTok entity.
Additional American investors such as Oracle and Blackstone, the private equity company, would join to decrease ByteDance's stake in the new version of TikTok.
A lot of TikTok's operations in the United States are already managed throughOracle servers, and the firm’s chairperson, Larry Ellison, has been a consistent supporter of former President Trump.
On Friday, ABC News stated that Walmart was part of the competition, driven by a last-minute show of interest from rival retailer Amazon to acquire the application.
Previously, Walmart and Oracle were speculated to acquire TikTok within the U.S. amid Trump’s attempts to seize control of the app from its Chinese proprietors during his initial term as president.
Trump long supported a ban or divestment, but has lately defended TikTok, seeing it as a reason more young voters supported him in November's election.
What about the algorithm?
There is still doubt, especially regarding the fate of TikTok's important algorithm.
Forrester Principal Analyst Kelsey Chickering stated, 'TikTok minus its algorithm is akin to Harry Potter without his wand — it’s considerably less potent.'
Several news outlets indicate that the new firm might obtain the algorithm from ByteDance under a licensing agreement, with ByteDance still being involved in TikTok.
However, this kind of setup would contradict the essence of the legislation, partly because it operates under the assumption that TikTok’s algorithm could be exploited by China as a tool against U.S. interests.