Social media platform TikTok could be acquired by Elon Musk in order to get around an impending ban in the United States.
The video-sharing app is due to be closed down within the US, possibly as early as this weekend, when an order by Congress comes into force.
TikTok has been told to either shut down or sell up if it is to continue operating in the country, leaving its Chinese owners, Bytedance, with some difficult decisions to make.
According to reports in the Wall Street Journal, one option could be to sell the operation to Musk, who already owns social media site X, which was formerly called Twitter.
Musk is close to both Trump and the Chinese Communist Party, having met its leaders regularly.
Tesla’s biggest factory is in China and the electric car firm earned $22 billion there in 2023.
Bytedance, a privately owned Chinese company, said at the time that it would consider selling Tiktok’s US operations but Tiktok then won an injunction against Trump’s ban. Trump left office before the courts could consider the matter further.
The ban was later resurrected as a bill, which was passed overwhelmingly by both houses of Congress and signed into law by President Biden.
Bytedance has been given until Jan 19th to either sell Tiktok or see it banned. Trump is due to be inaugurated the following day.
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