Once again, the US government is extracting value from businesses.
Once again, the US government is extracting value from businesses.
by Sean Hollister
Sep 19, 2025, 11:13 PM UTC
Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images
Sean Hollister
is a senior editor and founding member of The Verge who covers gadgets, games, and toys. He spent 15 years editing the likes of CNET, Gizmodo, and Engadget.
A 10 percent stake in Intel, 15 percent of Nvidia’s China sales, a “golden share” of Nippon Steel — what price will Trump extract next in exchange for favorable treatment? Well, The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Trump Administration is “expected to collect a multibillion-dollar fee” in exchange for negotiating a US takeover of TikTok’s US business.
That fee will reportedly come from TikTok’s US investors, including private equity firm Silver Lake and Oracle, with the new group getting half of TikTok, while TikTok China’s parent company ByteDance would still have under 20 percent.
Yesterday, Trump said that “the United States is getting a tremendous fee-plus, I call it a ‘fee-plus,’ just for making the deal.” But Trump says a lot of things that need dissecting, and it was absolutely unclear today whether there’s even a TikTok deal or not.
So to see the WSJ reporting that “people familiar with the matter” think a deal might not only get approved, but also see billions of dollars flow from US companies into the Trump Administration’s coffers, sounds like something to be aware of. Why would those companies pay Trump’s government billions unless they think they’ll make even more?
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