ByteDance’s valuation jumped to $480 billion in a transaction this week, more than doubling from the $230 billion reported in September last year. The increase came as Capital Today, a Chinese venture firm led by Kathy Xu, paid roughly $300 million for shares from Bank of China Group Investment at the elevated valuation, Bloomberg reported Thursday (November 20), citing people familiar with the matter. The deal also represented a markup from ByteDance’s recent valuations. The company initiated an employee share buyback program in September at a $330 billion valuation, sources told Bloomberg. The stock on offer Wednesday (November 19) was initially priced at about $200 million with ByteDance valued at $360 billion before competitive bidding drove up the price. Seven bidders participated in the auction, pushing the final valuation to $480 billion, a 45% increase from the September employee buyback price and a 33% jump from the initial offering price of up to $360 billion for this transaction, the report said. The surge in valuation comes as ByteDance prepares its annual institutional shareholder buyback program this month, sources told Bloomberg. Several investors, including SoftBank Group and Fidelity Investments, had already marked up their ByteDance holdings to valuations exceeding $400 billion earlier this year, Bloomberg reported. The $480 billion figure places ByteDance close to OpenAI, currently valued at $500 billion, the report said, citing data from CB Insights. Elon Musk’s SpaceX holds a roughly $400 billion valuation. In comparison, social media giant Meta has a market capitalization of $1. 49 trillion. In September last year, The Information reported, citing secondary market trades, that ByteDance reached a valuation of close to $230 billion after increasing its share price in a buyback program. ByteDance’s increasing valuation comes amid ongoing negotiations over TikTok’s US operations. US President Donald Trump on September 25 signed an executive order establishing a roadmap for the “qualified divestiture” of TikTok’s US operations to American hands. The president also delayed TikTok’s deadline to sell its US operations for a fourth time, to December 16, and ordered the Department of Justice not to enforce the divest-or-ban law until January 23, 2026, in order to give time for the deal to be finalized. TikTok has about 170 million users in the US. Bloomberg reported in September that about half of the profit from TikTok’s US operations will likely go to ByteDance even after selling a majority stake. Trump insists the deal has the backing of Chinese President Xi Jinping. “I told him what we were doing and he said go ahead with it,” he told reporters in late September. Most recently last month, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent claimed that the US and China have finalized the terms of a deal for TikTok’s US operations. Bessent said on CBS’s Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan: “We reached a final deal on TikTok.” Amid its uncertain future in the US, the platform continues to expand with new features for creators and other users. On Wednesday (November 19), TikTok said it is testing a feature that gives users control over how much artificial intelligence-generated content appears in their feeds. TikTok also announced a $2 million fund for AI literacy education. Music Business Worldwide.
https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/tiktok-owner-bytedances-valuation-hits-480bn-after-share-sale-report/
TikTok owner ByteDance’s valuation hits $480bn after share sale (report)
