“Mr. Wonderful” Kevin O’Leary is teaming up with another investor in an attempt to save TikTok and hopes China and the Supreme Court will allow them to make it “wonderful again”.
The “Shark Tank” star is teaming up with Project Liberty founder Frank McCourt to buy the platform’s US assets from its parent company, ByteDance, and “rebuild the platform in a way that prioritizes the privacy of its 170 million users Americans”.
TikTok is facing a possible ban due to the Protecting Americans from Applications Controlled by Foreign Adversaries Act, a law signed by President Biden that passed Congress last April with bipartisan approval.
Until midnight on January 19, the app may be removed from US-based app stores unless it is removed by its parent company.
“I want to work with him [McCourt] because he’s done a lot more work on the algorithm and he’s allowing me to be part of this deal so we can buy TikTok without buying the Chinese spyware,” O’Leary told “The Big Money Show” on Tuesday.
TikTok has faced controversy over being a China-based company and allegedly being used as spyware for the Chinese Communist Party.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have warned of the potential national security threat that TikTok allegedly poses over American phones.
“The reason TikTok is going to be canceled in the United States is because of the algorithms that allow you to spy,” O’Leary said, explaining how he and McCourt would restructure the platform so that users could decide whether to share their data with TikTok or not. Under their ownership, O’Leary argued, users who chose to share their data would be paid.
“If they share it and want to monetize it, they get a piece of the ad share. I think it’s fantastic,” he said. “We’re going to make this thing work the way the market wants it to, and then we’re going to take it around the world.”
If their bid to buy the social media platform is successful, O’Leary explained how they would change the platform to better align with US interests.
In addition to giving users ownership of their data and removing “Chinese spyware,” the investor pointed out that TikTok has the potential to grow from its current 170 million users to “past 200 million” by regaining user trust.
“We have to turn away all those who don’t believe it, who won’t put it on their phone. And the way to do that is to democratize it, to let people invest with us,” O’Leary said Friday on “Varney & Co,” on FOX Business.
“The third thing that I think everyone will find attractive, including Trump, is that we’re going to open it up so that it’s interactive. So if you’re posting on Truth Social or X, click here to populate TikTok. Everyone would like to do that. And we would ask others, like Instagram and Meta, to do the same. Let’s split two ways,” he added.
The investor also said what it would look like to bring countries like India, Switzerland, France, Canada and Germany to the platform after these changes are implemented.
“This thing is going to be the biggest TV network in the world within two years,” O’Leary said of TikTok’s growth potential.
O’Leary and McCourt’s bid will be affected by the Supreme Court’s long-awaited ruling on the law to ban the platform if it doesn’t take off, and then by ByteDance’s willingness to do so if their hand is forced ahead of schedule.
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments Friday in a fast-track case ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House. A final decision is expected before inauguration day.
O’Leary explained how a Supreme Court decision to uphold the ban would be “good news” for their bid.
“What that means is that the company makes a binary decision whether to let it close at midnight on the 19th or engage with a buyer,” he told America Reports Friday on Fox News. “Now, you may be aware that we’ve made an offer — I think we’re the only union formed that made a firm offer last night — for ByteDance, and they might want to start looking at that because there’s value of 30 to 40 billion dollars. American shareholder value is linked there. And if the supreme leader [Chinese President Xi Jinping] wants, we can just shut it down like they did in India and that capital is wiped out. And of course, that’s not good for future capital growth.”
O’Leary argued that his and McCourt’s ambitious plans for TikTok rely heavily on Xi Jinping.
“I think the only person who matters in this deal is the supreme leader, who has to decide. All Chinese companies are controlled by him,” he said.
O’Leary went on to explain how China wants to be considered a “destination” for capital, explaining that every country needs it to grow its economy, even those in adversarial positions with the US like China.
“They are competing for the status of the largest economy. So if you want to be a big boy and want to play international markets, you don’t wipe out the shareholders’ money. It’s not just American shareholders. Every sovereign wealth fund around the world, many of them have huge investments in ByteDance,” he said.
“But it won’t be my decision or Frank McCourt’s decision. We have both placed our unions there. We have made the offer. Every American shareholder has our offer. They know it. And that’s really up to ByteDance to decide.”
O’Leary stressed that he thinks ByteDance should seriously consider their offer after their free speech argument in court “fell on deaf ears.”
“We will make speech very free. We will improve it and make sure we comply with the court orders. This is the right path,” he said.
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