Amazon bids to buy TikTok as deadline looms, New York Times reports

Reuters

Wed, Apr 2, 2025, 9:00 AM 2 min read

(Reuters) -Amazon.com has enactment successful a last-minute connection to bargain each of short-form video app TikTok, the New York Times reported connected Wednesday, citing 3 radical acquainted with the bid.

U.S. President Donald Trump volition see connected Wednesday a last connection related to TikTok up of an April 5 deadline for the app to find a non-Chinese purchaser oregon look a prohibition successful the country, a White House authoritative told Reuters connected Tuesday.

ByteDance and TikTok did not instantly respond to Reuters' requests for comment, and Amazon declined to respond.

Shares of Amazon roseate 1.3% successful a measurement spike aft the report.

Various parties who person been progressive successful the talks bash not look to beryllium taking Amazon's bid seriously, the New York Times said.

The bid came via an connection missive addressed to Vice President JD Vance and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, the study added.

The aboriginal of the app utilized by astir fractional of each Americans has been up successful the aerial since a 2024 law, passed with overwhelming bipartisan support, required ByteDance to divest TikTok by January 19.

Washington says TikTok's ownership by ByteDance makes it beholden to the Chinese government, and Beijing could usage the app to behaviour power operations against the United States and cod information connected Americans.

Trump, aft taking bureau for a 2nd word connected January 20, signed an enforcement bid seeking to hold by 75 days the enforcement of the law, allowing TikTok to proceed its operations successful the U.S. temporarily.

Since then, respective parties person reportedly expressed involvement successful TikTok, with Trump saying past period that his medication was successful interaction with 4 antithetic groups astir the merchantability of the platform.

(Reporting by Akash Sriram, Jaspreet Singh and Zaheer Kachwala successful Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Deborah Sophia; Editing by Shreya Biswas and Shinjini Ganguli)