Report: China Suggests TikTok Can Decide Independently on Potential Deals

China reportedly signaled that it would be open to a transaction that would keep TikTok available in the United States.

The country’s foreign ministry said companies should “decide independently” when it comes to their operations and deals, Reuters reported Monday (Jan. 20).

A U.S. law requiring TikTok to be sold or banned by Sunday (Jan. 19) was upheld by the Supreme Court on Friday (Jan. 17) but then-President Joe Biden’s administration said it would not enforce the law, leaving that to the Trump administration when it took office Monday.

The TikTok app and website were operational in the U.S. on Monday but the app was not available for download in the Apple and Google app stores, according to the Reuters report. Reuters attributed that to the companies waiting for clearer legal assurances before returning the app to their stores.

TikTok itself was hoping for an executive order from President Donald Trump that would allow it more time to strike a deal, according to the report. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew attended Trump’s inauguration, as did Amazon Founder Jeff Bezos, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Google CEO Sundar Pichai.

Trump said earlier that he would issue such an executive order, per the report.

On Sunday, the TikTok ban went into effect for a few hours before the company restored service.

That move came after Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform that he would sign an executive order extending the ban deadline and promising there would be no liability for any company that helped keep TikTok from going dark.

Trump also said he wants the U.S. to hold a 50% stake in a joint venture, though it was not clear how this arrangement would be structured.

TikTok thanked Trump for providing “the necessary clarity” and said it would work with the new administration on a solution to keep its app in the U.S.

It was reported Saturday (Jan. 19) that search engine startup Perplexity AI wants to merge with TikTok and has submitted a bid to the app’s China-based parent company ByteDance.

Reuters reported that Perplexity would merge with TikTok U.S. to form a new entity by combining the merged company with New Capital Partners.