US Treasury’s Bessent says China has approved TikTok transfer deal
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China’s Commerce Ministry said in a statement earlier on Oct 30 that China would properly handle TikTok-related issues with the US.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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WASHINGTON - China has approved the transfer agreement for the short video app TikTok
“In Kuala Lumpur, we finalised the TikTok agreement in terms of getting Chinese approval, and I would expect that would go forward in the coming weeks and months, and we’ll finally see a resolution to that,” he told Fox Business Network following President Donald Trump’s meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping
China’s Commerce Ministry said in a statement earlier on Oct 30 that China would properly handle TikTok-related issues with the United States.
TikTok, which is owned by China-based ByteDance, did not immediately comment.
The fate of the app used by 170 million Americans has remained uncertain for more than 18 months after the US Congress passed a law in 2024 that ordered TikTok’s Chinese owners to sell the app’s US assets by January 2025.
Mr Trump signed an executive order on Sept 25 declaring that the plan to sell TikTok’s US operations to a consortium of US and global investors
He also delayed until Jan 20 enforcement of the law.
Mr Trump’s order said the algorithm will be retrained and monitored by the US company’s security partners, and operation of the algorithm will be under the control of the new joint venture.
The agreement on TikTok’s US operations includes the appointment by ByteDance of one of seven board members for the new entity, with Americans holding the other six seats.
ByteDance would hold less than 20 per cent in TikTok US to comply with requirements set out in the law that ordered it to be shut down by January 2025 if ByteDance did not sell its US assets.
Representative John Moolenaar, the Republican chair of the House Select Committee on China, said in September that a licensing agreement for use of the TikTok algorithm, as part of a deal by ByteDance to sell US assets of the short video app, would raise “serious concerns”. REUTERS
