China considers selling TikTok to Elon Musk

The Chinese government is weighing a plan for Elon Musk to acquire TikTok to avoid a nationwide ban.

Transcript

00:00I'm Conway Gittins reporting from the New York Stock Exchange. Here's what we're watching on the street today.

00:04Wall Street is finding some relief Tuesday after the latest inflation numbers. The producer price index rose just 0.2% in December,

00:12cooler than expected.

00:14Excluding food and energy, prices were flat. According to the report, headline inflation was up 3.3% from the same time last year,

00:22which was softer than the previous two months.

00:24Investors are looking ahead to another report on inflation out Wednesday for clues into the Federal Reserve's next move.

00:31In other news, the future of TikTok in America is in doubt and now Elon Musk's name has been thrown into the mix.

00:38The Chinese government is mulling an idea that would sell TikTok's U.S. operations to Elon Musk,

00:44according to reporting by Bloomberg.

00:46The popular social media app could face a ban on January 19th

00:50if it does not comply with the U.S. law to split from Chinese parent company ByteDance.

00:55As the world's richest man, Musk certainly has the money to do a deal.

00:59He already owns X, formerly known as Twitter. A deal would give Musk access to more than

01:06170 million TikTok users in the U.S.

01:08That kind of number would go a long way when it comes to commanding ad dollars that he can't do with just X.

01:15Musk could also use the large troves of data produced by TikTok to fuel his artificial intelligence company, X.A.I.

01:23In addition, Musk has the ear of President-elect Donald Trump, who originally wanted to ban TikTok the first time

01:31he was president, but has since changed his tune. So far,

01:34there's been no response from Musk on the Bloomberg report. ByteDance has been quiet as well.

01:39Meanwhile, time is running out for TikTok. Early indications from the Supreme Court suggest the justices will deny

01:46ByteDance's legal challenge to the ban.

01:49That'll do it for your daily briefing from the New York Stock Exchange. I'm Conway Gittins with The Street.