The list of potential future owners of TikTok's U.S. operations has grown to include OnlyFans founder Tim Stokely and Amazon.
In 2024, congress passed a law that set a deadline for TikTok's Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to sell the popular social media platform and video sharing site's U.S. operations by January 19, 2025. The ban went into effect but it returned within a day after Donald Trump—who proposed the app be banned in 2020 due to security concerns—allowed ByteDance to seek a buyer within 75 days. The app is set to go offline if a buyer isn't sorted by April 5.
As reported by Reuters, OnlyFans founder Tim Stokely has joined forces with a cryptocurrency company for a last-minute bid to purchase TikTok from ByteDance. The bid was sent to the White House this week by Stokely's new startup Zoop, and Hedera cryptocurrency network treasury manager the Hbar Foundation. "Our bid for TikTok isn't just about changing ownership, it's about creating a new paradigm where both creators and their communities benefit directly from the value they generate," added Zoop's co-founder RJ Phillips.
Per the New York Times, Jeff Bezos' omnipresent Amazon has also entered a bid to take control of TikTok. However, it appears as though the White House is not taking the Amazon bid as seriously as some of the other offers that have come its way.
But there are still many other potential future TikTok owners in the mix, including Oracle. The company has history with TikTok, too, having previously entered a partnership with its parent company to handle the data of its users in the United States. Their plan would see ByteDance remain the sole owner of TikTok's algorithm, though. There's also MrBeast, who is teaming up with Employer.com founder Jesse Tinsley and Roblox CEO David Baszucki for a bid, and Shark Tank star Kevin O'Leary's bid with Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt.
Other names in the mix include Blackstone, Microsoft, and AI-powered search engine Perplexity.
