The fate of the app, used by 170 million Americans, has remained uncertain for more than 18 months.
Published October 30, 2025
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said China has approved a deal to move short-video app TikTok, adding that he expects the deal to move forward in the coming weeks and months, but gave no other details.
“In Kuala Lumpur, we finalized the TikTok agreement in terms of getting China’s approval. We expect that to move forward in the coming weeks and months, and we will ultimately see a resolution to that,” Bessent said Thursday on Fox Business Network’s “Morning with Maria” after a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Recommended stories
list of 4 itemsend of list
China’s Ministry of Commerce said in a statement early Thursday that it will appropriately address TikTok-related issues with the United States. The Chinese spokesperson added, “The Chinese side will cooperate with the US side to appropriately deal with TikTok-related issues.”
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 since the U.S. Congress passed a law in 2024 ordering TikTok’s Chinese owners to sell the app’s U.S. assets by January 2025.
Last month, President Trump signed an executive order declaring that TikTok’s plan to sell its U.S. operations to a coalition of U.S. and global investors meets the national security requirements of a 2024 law, and gave the company 120 days to complete the deal. He postponed the enforcement of the law until January 20, 2026.
According to President Trump’s order, the algorithms will be retrained and monitored by the U.S. company’s security partners, and their operations will be under the control of the new joint venture.
The agreement for TikTok’s U.S. operations includes ByteDance appointing one of the new company’s seven directors, with the remaining six seats being held by Americans.
If ByteDance does not sell its U.S. assets, its U.S. stake in TikTok will be less than 20% in order to comply with the requirements of the law that mandates its closure by January 2025.
U.S. Rep. John Moolener, the Republican chairman of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, said this month that a licensing agreement for the use of TikTok’s algorithm as part of ByteDance’s deal to sell the short video app’s U.S. assets would raise “serious concerns.”
