There are new questions surrounding a proposed deal to keep TikTok operating in the U.S. after two of the major parties involved issued conflicting statements on Monday.
China-based ByteDance said in a statement it will own 80% of TikTok Global in the U.S. as part of its partnership with Oracle and Walmart. But that arrangement would appear to contradict President Donald Trump's comments from over the weekend that the U.S.-based TikTok "will have nothing to do with China."
Oracle said Monday in a statement to Reuters that ByteDance's ownership of TikTok Global would be distributed to ByteDance's investors, and that the Beijing-based company would have no take in the new TikTok Global.
Asked Monday morning on "Fox and Friends" about ByteDance saying it would still own 80% after the proposed deal, Trump said the company would “have nothing to do with it, and if they do we just won’t make the deal.”
“And if we find that they don’t have total control, then we’re not going to approve the deal,” the president said.
Trump said that, if completed, the new company would likely be based it Texas and include the hiring of at least 25,000 people.
Over the weekend, TikTok said Oracle and Walmart could acquire up to a cumulative 20% stake in the new company in a financing round to be held before an initial public offering of stock, which Walmart said could happen within the next year. Oracle's stake would be 12.5%, and Walmart's would be 7.5%, the companies said in separate statements.
Trump has been demanding that the U.S. operations of TikTok be sold to a U.S. company or else be shut down. He's also been targeting WeChat, another Chinese-owned app.
There is still a chance that TikTok could be banned in the U.S. as of Nov. 12 if the deal isn't completed, under the restrictions put in place by the Commerce Department. However, a restriction to bar TikTok from app stores in the U.S., was pushed back a week to Sept. 27 after Trump backed the latest TikTok deal.
TikTok says it has 100 million U.S. users.
