Sept. 17 (UPI) — TikTok will be operated by a consortium of U.S. venture capital firms, private equity funds and tech companies if President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping approve a deal hammered out by their negotiators when they speak Friday.
Under the framework agreed in talks in Madrid this week, investors led by Oracle, Horowitz and Silver Lake would own around 80% of a new U.S. company that will run TikTok’s American operation, with the remaining stake owned by Chinese shareholders, according to sources cited by CNN, CNBC and The New York Times.
The operating company would be under the direction of a majority-U.S. board with one member appointed by the administration.
On the basis of the agreement, Trump on Tuesday extended by 90 days the deadline for ByteDance, TikTok’s Chinese parent company, to divest from the video-sharing app and sell to an American company, as required by legislation signed into law by the Biden administration in April 2024.
Having already extended the original Jan. 19 deadline three times, Trump issued a fourth executive order taking the deadline to Dec. 16 to prevent TikTok from being forced to pull its app from U.S. app stores on Wednesday, when his previous extension would have expired.
The order effectively blocks the Justice Department from enforcing national security provisions in the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act.
The sources said discussions that could alter the final deal were continuing, but that Trump and Xi were expected to sign off on it in a phone call scheduled for Friday, with an anticipated timetable for closing the deal of 30-45 days.
Speculation was already rife that Larry Ellison, Oracle’s executive chairman, was in negotiations to buy out TikTok’s assets in the United States on the basis of an existing, longstanding relationship with TikTok in which it provides cloud-hosting for the platform’s data, in addition to being Trump’s clear favourite to step in.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC on Tuesday that the U.S. side was able to get the agreement over the line by letting it be known that Trump was prepared to stand by and allow TikTok to “go dark,” given Chinese efforts to link the deal to tariffs and trade issues.
“We were able to reach a series of agreements, mostly for things we will not be doing in the future that have no effect on our national security,” he said.
The White House refused to comment, calling the details being circulated “pure speculation.”
TikTok did not immediately comment on the development.