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...ByteDance, the app’s Beijing-based parent, is facing a backlash from US employees over a stock awards programme that blocks them from cashing in their shares while leaving them exposed to a large potential...
...ByteDance as a whole is on track to overtake Facebook owner Meta as the world’s largest social media company by sales....
...ByteDance is tapping a cash pile of more than $50bn accumulated from its popular short-video apps to buy back up to $5bn worth of shares from investors....
...Downloads of TikTok, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, edged up a mere 4 per cent to 733mn over the same period....
...ByteDance tested a generative AI feature for its social media app TikTok earlier this year, named TikTok Tako, which licenses OpenAI’s ChatGPT....
...ByteDance is also unlikely to list on public markets in the US or arrange for external investors to buy a large chunk of employee shares while the US Senate weighs a bill that could lead to a national ban...
...The US lawmakers’ move this week to advance a bill to force a separation of TikTok from Chinese-owned ByteDance over national security concerns has caught investors by surprise, sending them scrambling to...
...ByteDance introduced a “996” culture — encouraging staff to work from 9am until 9pm for six days a week — to the US TikTok operation that it already oversaw in its Chinese operations, the filing said....
...“I’m very happy that Speaker Johnson and House leaders incorporated my recommendation to extend the ByteDance divestment period from six months to a year,” Cantwell said....
...TikTok has tried to distance itself from ByteDance by investing more than $1.5bn on “Project Texas”, a restructuring plan it insists protects user data and content from China’s influence....
...That is a large chunk of ByteDance’s own valuation — about $260bn based on last year’s share buyback from employees. A forced sale is likely to mean a much lower price....
...A TikTok spokesperson did not respond to questions about how ByteDance could deny such requests from Beijing....
...China has powers to block the export of ByteDance’s algorithms that power TikTok and Beijing’s commerce ministry said last year it would “firmly oppose” a forced sale by ByteDance....
...US officials worry that ByteDance would be unable to refuse a request from Beijing to hand over Americans’ user data because of a Chinese national security law that requires companies to provide information...
...On Wednesday, the House of Representatives passed a bill to ban the social media app unless it is sold by its Chinese-based parent ByteDance — by a resounding 352-65 votes....
...ByteDance....
...Beijing’s commerce ministry said last year it would “firmly oppose” a forced sale by ByteDance....
...The House of Representatives is next week expected to vote on the measure, which would impose a ban unless ByteDance, the app’s Chinese owner, divests the app within six months....
...The move comes as the US Congress prepares for a Saturday vote on a bill to ban ByteDance-owned short video app TikTok if it is not divested to a non-Chinese owner....
...ByteDance-owned TikTok has agreed to invest $1.5bn in a unit of Indonesia’s GoTo in a deal designed to rescue its shopping business in the country two months after the introduction of regulation threatening...
...The overwhelming support for the bill has signalled widespread agreement in Washington that TikTok represents a threat to American national security while it is owned by ByteDance....
...TikTok is a tool that has proven so valuable — for social influence campaigns and espionage — that ByteDance is spending money hand over fist on an intimidation campaign....
...It permits ByteDance to bring a legal challenge within 165 days of the bill becoming law....
...and China,” said the head of private equity investments at a public pension plan that owns ByteDance stakes....
...Some senior ByteDance officials discount that prospect. Other financiers think a buyout looms....
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