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The photo illustration shows the TikTok logo displayed on the phone screen.
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Canadian investor Kevin O’Leary is still interested in a TikTok deal, but it’s not possible under current law, he told CNBC, as President Donald Trump extended the deadline for the platform’s ban social media.
As part of a wave of executive orders after his inauguration on Monday, Trump delayed by 75 days the imposition of a law which sees TikTok effectively banned, allowing its administration “an opportunity to determine the appropriate course of action.”
Trump had promised the move in a social media post Sunday, also floating an agreement that sees the platform remain active in the United States under a joint venture with 50% American ownership.
“This 50/50 deal, I would like to work with Trump, so any other potential buyer … But the problem with some of these ideas is that they are inconsistent with the decision of the Supreme Court,” said the investor. widely known for his role on ABC’s “Shark Tank.”
O’Leary announced that he, with “The people’s offer for TikTok,“An effort led by the Founder of the Freedom Project Frank McCourt, had offered ByteDance $ 20 billion in cash to buy TikTok in an appearance on. “America’s Newsroom” by Fox News.
Speaking to CNBC, he said the proposed deal did not include ByteDance’s TikTok algorithm, which has been a key point of scrutiny by US lawmakers, adding that his group had an alternative algorithm.
ByteDance had not announced any deal before a Sunday deadline to divest from TikTok after the Supreme Court. sustained him Protecting Americans from the Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Actor PAFACA, that applies to TikTok.
McCourt confirmed to CNBC that the Project Liberty team was “ready to work collaboratively with the Trump Administration, ByteDance, and a consortium of US partners to finalize this critical agreement.”
“Project Liberty has a stack of proven technologies that are already in use and offer a clear path to address the national security concerns of Congress while keeping TikTok operational,” he added.
Legal obstacles
The companies involved in TikTok had different reactions to Trump’s executive order. Service providers such as Oracle and Akamai have volunteered to keep TikTok online, while Apple and Google have restored ByteDance’s apps in their stores.
According to O’Leary, while Trump’s extension of the ban will likely protect the likes of Oracle and Akamai, it is unclear whether ByteDance’s deadline to comply will be extended.
“What we need is not really a 75-day extension. What we need is to go back and ask Congress to open the order and provide these new options, because they are not provided for now,” he said.
“I would like to make a deal, if the law provided for it, but I do not have the luxury of violating the order of Congress,” he added.
Legal experts who spoke to CNBC agreed that the legal status of TikTok and Trump’s executive order remained uncertain and that any effort to reach a TikTok deal could face challenges.
“The Order does not seem to comply with the statute. Congress carefully included certain dates and procedures in the law, which SCOTUS found constitutional,” said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond .
“Thus, a federal court could find that the Order violates the law and invalidate it,” he said, adding, however, that such an action could take a long time if the government appeals to SCOTUS.
Sarah Kreps, Director of Cornell University’s Technology Policy Institute, agreed that the executive order was inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s decision, adding that it said nothing about progress toward a qualified divestment. .
Since violators of the TikTok law could face billions in fines, it is not entirely prudent for parties to take Trump’s assurances on the law and the SCOTUS decision, Kreps said.
“They certainly play with the law and put considerable faith in the executive authority,” he added.
China softens stance
O’Leary told CNBC that TikTok it could take $20-$30 billion on the market in March of last year, a huge discount, given that any sale would probably exclude the algorithms of the platform.
Instead, the value in a potential deal was the opportunity to gain TikTok’s strong domestic brand and its more than 100 million usershe said.
However, around the time that the conversations about a sale of TikTok increased, Beijing was seen as a major barrier to a divestment of BytdeDance.
However, Beijing recently signaled openness to a deal that would see American companies acquire ownership of the platform.
“When it comes to actions such as the operation and acquisition of companies, we believe that they should be decided independently by the companies in accordance with the principles of the market,” a Beijing spokesman said on Monday when asked about President Donald Trump’s proposal.
According to O’Leary, any potential sale of ByteDance is still expected to be negotiated between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
“With TikTok, I have the right to sell it or close it, and we will make that determination and we may also have the approval of China,” Trump told reporters after his inauguration.
By signing the executive order, the president reportedly suggested that he could impose tariffs on China if Beijing failed to approve a US agreement with TikTok. On Tuesday, he said he would consider the possibility of Tesla CEO Elon Musk or president of Oracle Larry Ellison Buy TikTok.
Meanwhile, O’Leary told CNBC he was in Washington still working on a potential TikTok deal with US lawmakers.
