What the TikTok Deal Means for the App’s Future in the US

The yearslong saga over the future of TikTok’s American operations has finally reached a conclusion. The social media platform said on Jan. 23 that its US arm has been bought by a consortium led by Oracle Corp., formalizing the deal outlined by the Trump administration in September.

The sale is designed to comply with a national security law signed in 2024 by then-US President Joe Biden — the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act — which mandates that Chinese owner ByteDance Ltd. reduce its ownership of TikTok US to less than 20%. The law gave ByteDance an ultimatum: divest majority control of TikTok US by Jan. 20, 2025, or the app would be banned nationwide. President Donald Trump extended this deadline multiple times after reentering office, most recently pushing it out to January 2026.