Back in 2024, US Congress passed a law to ban TikTok unless parent company ByteDance divested most of its US-based operations with 80% going to companies headquartered in the US. The US Supreme Court upheld that law, but it really only resulted in a blip – a 13-hour blackout.
Soon after returning to office, President Trump gave TikTok a 75-day grace period and then another and when that ran out, Trump pushed the ban back by 90 days. Perhaps it wouldn’t surprise you to learn that has been another delay – a new executive order has given TikTok 90 more days to reach a deal.
To be fair, plenty of would-be buyers have been circling, from Amazon to MrBeast, and a deal was close to being finalized. Reuters reported in early April that a deal was approved by new and existing investors and even by the US government and ByteDance itself – however, that deal fell through in the wake of Trump’s tariff war with China.
TikTok introduced the “MVPs of POV” program earlier this month
So, now investors have until mid-September to woo ByteDance and work out another deal. According to the law, 80% of TikTok’s US operations should be owned by US investors, while the remaining 20% will be retained by ByteDance.
A crucial stumbling block that would have to be overcome by any deal is that it would have to be approved by the Chinese government. TikTok has become a bargaining chip in the US-China trade war, so any deal is in danger of falling through due to external factors.