From the ban to the taking of war, it is a step that many dream of taking. Thus, Donald Trump’s former Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, announced Thursday March 14 that he was setting up a financing round to buy TikTok.
The day after the vote by the US House of Representatives, which gave ByteDance six months to sell its subsidiary to non-Chinese interests, Mr. Mnuchin, who heads Liberty Strategic Capital, detailed his views on CNBC: “It’s a great deal and I’m going to put together a group to buy TikTok.” (…) I think the legislation should be passed and I think [Tiktok] should be sold. It should be owned by American companies. The Chinese would never let an American company own something like that in China. » Mr. Mnuchin says he has made contact with investors, none of whom own more than 10% of TikTok’s capital.
The Chinese government denounced an attempted theft: “It is the logic of theft to see something good and try to take it by any means necessaryaccused Wang Wenbin, spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, on Thursday. If the pretext of national security can be used to arbitrarily suppress excellent companies from other countries, there is no fairness or justice to speak of. »
Algorithm so efficient
During previous tensions, the Chinese government had indicated that it would not authorize ByteDance to sell TikTok to an American buyer, while its algorithm, which is so effective in attracting users, remains secret and arouses everyone’s desire.
For the legislation to become effective, the bill must be passed by the Senate and then signed by the President of the United States. Some senators are concerned about the constitutionality of the text, because of the freedom of expression guaranteed by the First Amendment of the United States and because the law specifically targets TikTok, which is in theory prohibited. The leader of the Democratic majority did not specify how he intended to examine the text, which must normally receive 60 votes out of 100.
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew suggested a sale was not an option. ByteDance was valued at $220 billion during its last fundraising in 2023, specifies NBC. In 2020, ByteDance set the price of its TikTok subsidiary at $60 billion when Donald Trump wanted to force it to sell it, according to the Bloomberg agency.
You have 25.63% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.