PANews reported on January 14 that Bloomberg News cited people familiar with the matter as saying that Chinese officials are evaluating a possible plan to sell TikTok's US business to Elon Musk if it fails to prevent the US ban. Although TikTok's parent company ByteDance prefers to block the ban through an appeal, signs from the US Supreme Court's hearing indicate that the ban may be upheld.

The plan envisions that Musk's X (formerly Twitter) will take over TikTok's US business and integrate it with its existing platform. This move will not only increase advertising revenue by leveraging TikTok's 170 million US users, but may also provide rich data support for Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI. However, the transaction needs to be approved by the Chinese government, especially regarding the transfer of TikTok's core algorithm.

Currently, TikTok's US business is valued at between $40 billion and $50 billion, but it is unclear whether Musk has enough resources to complete the transaction. ByteDance said its primary goal is still to retain TikTok's business in the United States through legal means.

Later, the BBC reported that TikTok responded by saying that the report that "the US business will be sold to Musk" was "pure fiction."