Business

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TikTok

Opinion

Stephen Bartholomeusz Senior business columnist September 17, 2025 — 12.00pm

For eight months, TikTok has been operating in America in breach of the law, kept alive by Donald Trump’s executive orders that may also have been in breach of that law. Now, it appears, the Chinese-controlled app may be about to be legalised.

On Tuesday, US and Chinese negotiators reached a “framework” agreement that envisages the sale of ByteDance’s US business to a combination of new US investors and its own US shareholders.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent who, with US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, met their Chinese counterparts, said the Chinese had come in with “a big list of asks,” which he said they described as compensation.

“With the leverage th

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