Since its launch in 2017, TikTok has rapidly captured the hearts of a reported 100m people in the US, including much of Generation Z. But it has also provoked deep suspicion from some US politicians due to its Chinese ownership, which critics say make it a de facto spying tool for the People’s Republic.
Dan Ives, managing director of equity research at Wedbush Securities, said the Trump administration’s belligerence towards TikTok had put ByteDance’s “back against the wall”.
He went on: “If they decided to play with fire and just walk away from the US market, it would take about 40-50pc of the valuation off ByteDance… that would be a body blow to TikTok.
“It could be a doomsday scenario, where they are wildly popular today but gone tomorrow. With competitors going after market share by the minute, right now time is not on their side, and their options are limited.”
The app would almost certainly be Microsoft’s biggest acquisition to date – the last one being LinkedIn, forwhich it paid $28bn in 2016.
