Trump administration to receive $10B fee from investors in TikTok US deal

The Trump administration is set to receive about $10 billion from investors as part of a deal transferring control of TikTok's US operations, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal on Friday.

The payment is part of an agreement under which investors aligned with the administration took control of TikTok's US operations from its Chinese parent company ByteDance, people familiar with the matter told the newspaper.

The fee is separate from the investments made to establish a new entity that will operate the app in the US.

The investors include cloud computing firm Oracle, private equity company Silver Lake and Abu Dhabi-based investor MGX.

According to the report, the group and other backers paid about $2.5 billion to the US Treasury when the deal closed in January and are expected to make several additional payments until the total reaches $10 billion.

The report said such a payment would be highly unusual for a government involved in arranging a private transaction.

US Vice President JD Vance said the new entity handling TikTok's US operations is valued at around $14 billion under the deal.

Administration officials said the fee reflects Trump's role in preserving TikTok's operations in the US and leading negotiations with China to finalize the agreement while addressing lawmakers' national security concerns, the report added.