ByteDance Seeks $60 Billion TikTok Valuation in US Deal

ByteDance, the Chinese parent company for TikTok is seeking a valuation worth $60 billion for the pop video sharing app's U.S. deal.

The valuation from ByteDance comes as Oracle and Walmart take stakes in TikTok, reported Bloomberg News. The U.S. deal was made to address security concerns.

President Donald Trump initially expressed hesitance in TikTok, having the majority of its stake held by ByteDance. But, while the U.S. deal is not as he'd hoped, he gave it his "blessing" after assurance that the app's data will be stored securely.

As it appears, the app won't be banned in the U.S. after all.

Final U.S. Deal Valuation in the Works

The reinvented company will be TikTok Global, and it will be based on Texas, said a report from The Guardian.

Under the new name, Oracle will take about 12.5% stake and store TikTok's entire U.S. user data in its cloud, Reuters said in a report. This will comply with the national security requirements of the government, the companies said on Saturday. Meanwhile, retail giant Walmart will have a 7.5% stake.

Both Oracle and Walmart will then pay a combined $12 billion for their stakes if they agree to a $60 billion asking price.

All four of the involved companies did not respond to comment on the report yet.

The final valuation for the deal has not yet been set. The companies are still working out the equity structure and measures for data security.

Trump Agrees to TikTok Deal "Conceptually"

President Donald Trump said on Saturday that he was on board with the deal "conceptually."

The new company can employ around 25,000 people, as said by Trump.

For this reason, he gave the company his approval. "If they get it done, that's great; if they don't, that's OK too," said Trump.

Despite getting approval from Trump, the deal still has to go through the Chinese government to move forward, said a BBC report.

Just recently, Trump said his administration would ban people from downloading TikTok from any app store starting Sunday.

However, "recent positive developments" held a pause on the plan. The ban could be delayed for a week, until September 27.

U.S. Deal Resolved Trump's Security Concerns

After TikTok first received ban threats, it has not stopped receiving criticism and speculation of sharing data with the Chinese government. Amid all of these accusations, the company denied handling the data in insecure ways.

Once he had been briefed about the deal, he said the data of about 100 million U.S. users would be safely stored in the Oracle cloud.

"The security will be 100%," he said to reporters. He ensured that it would be "totally controlled by Oracle and Walmart."

The company's directors will be mostly from the U.S., and it will also have a U.S. chief executive. There is also going to be a security expert involved in TikTok Global.

TikTok was pleased that security concerns on their app have already been resolved.

Working with Oracle, the app's source code will be inspected by the California based company.

The IPO for TikTok Global will also be on the U.S. stock exchange. It is expected to be ready after about a year.

Check these out!