As Elon Musk grew Tesla’s business in China, he publicly cozied up to its leaders on his favorite social media platform.

After years of rejecting the idea of a sale of TikTok’s US assets to an American buyer in order to avert a ban, China and ByteDance may have found an owner they could live with: Elon Musk.

Musk acquired X (then Twitter) in October 2022 after a highly publicized back and forth, in which he gave up on the acquisition midway but ultimately closed the deal, paying $44 billion for the platform. X's user base has been on a decline since the acquisition, and advertising revenues have plummeted.

Chinese officials reportedly want ByteDance Ltd. to remain the owners of TikTok but is in discussion on how to work with the Trump Administration.

TikTok denied a report that China is exploring a sale of the app to Elon Musk to keep TikTok operational in America amid a looming U.S. ban.

Chinese officials are looking into selling the U.S. operations of TikTok to Elon Musk if the social media firm ultimately gets banned here, according to reports.

If ByteDance decides to sell, TikTok's U.S. operations could be worth as much as $50 billion. The Chinese government has considered a plan in which Elon Musk could acquire TikTok's operations as part of several potential scenarios.