TikTok’s reprieve in US offers hope for other Chinese tech companies
- The new Biden administration suspended legal actions against the popular video-sharing app while reviewing US policy toward China tech companies
- The review also raises the prospect that other actions by former president Trump against Chinese firms might be reversed

Last week, the United States granted TikTok a reprieve by suspending legal actions against it, a move that gives hope not only to the Chinese-owned video sharing app, but to other Chinese tech companies also facing bans instituted by the Trump administration.
With the government’s months-long legal case paused, TikTok, owned by the tech giant ByteDance, can continue to operate in the US until at least the new Biden administration completes a review on US policy toward tech applications developed by Chinese companies. At that point, what TikTok ends up facing could offer clues to what may come for apps like Tencent’s WeChat, QQ, and Ant Group’s Alipay – all of which are under threat of US restrictions after being singled out by former president Donald Trump.
It’s unclear whether President Joe Biden will let TikTok off the hook completely, but the business community is exuberant. Just weeks after he became president, Biden has made it clear that numerous actions taken by his predecessor, even if not revoked completely, would at least be put under the microscope for scrutiny. That approach alone is enough to give businesses and investors hope that US policy could soon become more friendly.
“We believe this TikTok move will open the floodgates to reverse the Trump executive orders,” said Dan Ives at investment firm Wedbush Securities in New York. “Biden will ratchet down tensions with China and start to undo actions such as delisting companies from the US.”
A TikTok spokesman declined to comment for the story.
Appeals begin
Businesses have been quick to appeal to Biden to revoke Trump’s restrictions. Hours after he was inaugurated on January 20, China’s three biggest telecommunications firms – China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom – announced that they had asked the federal government to review a decision by the New York Stock Exchange to delist their shares, calling unfounded an accusation by the Pentagon that they aid the Chinese military.