It’s certainly fair to consider nefarious reasons, but it’s also important to consider less interesting reasons, like Kodak already (historically) dealing heavily with chemical production and Oracle making a bid to pivot and stay relevant. Who else might want to pay the most for TikTok US? From FAANG, only Facebook seems like a fit but Facebook won’t pay “market” rate for TikTok because they already have Reels, Microsoft and AANG don’t seem like fits. Outside of those, it’s some private equity group but they would need to spin up an operation around actually running and developing TikTok, that’s complicated.

Or it could all just be sweetheart deals.