U.S. President Donald Trump said in an interview with Fox News that he will call Chinese leader Xi Jinping on September 19 to discuss the TikTok deal, among other things. He believes that the Chinese authorities have agreed to finalize the terms of the deal on the sale of the Chinese social network TikTok by the ByteDance group to American companies.
Euronews in this regard notes that according to the US media, Friday’s conversation could be an important indicator of the possibility of a face-to-face meeting between the leaders of the two countries to resolve trade disputes.
The publication notes that the parties have already agreed on the framework and commercial terms of the deal on the sale of TikTok. A US government official told Reuters that Washington is ready to block TikTok if it fails to reach an agreement with Beijing on the ByteDance deal. At the same time, Trump himself described the social network as “a company that the young people of our country really wanted to save.”
The law requiring ByteDance to sell or cease operating the social network in the US was signed into law in 2024 by then-President Biden. Once in office, Trump signed an executive order delaying the blocking of the platform and repeatedly postponed the deadline.
According to The New York Post, Washington is planning a new US company with an estimated value of $50 billion, which, if a deal is struck, would keep TikTok operating in the US. As the publication specified, the main shareholders of the new company will be billionaire Jeff Yass, who is a Trump supporter, as well as Bill Ford, who heads the investment company General Atlantic. ByteDance will get a stake of about 20% in the new company.
