Hours after president-elect Donald Trump told reporters that he had a "soft spot" for the embattled social media platform TikTok, its parent company ByteDance appealed to the Supreme Court to stop a bill that could result in the platform being banned in the US.
"TikTok is asking the court to do what it has traditionally done in free-speech cases: apply the most rigorous scrutiny to speech bans and conclude that it violates the First Amendment," the company said on its website, along with a link to the full Supreme Court appeal.
"The Supreme Court has an established record of upholding Americans’ right to free speech." The statement also claimed that if TikTok is banned in the US, small businesses and creators on the platform would lose more than $1 billion.
TikTok's lawyers recently failed to convince judges in a US federal appeals court to strike down a bipartisan ban passed by US Congress, which seeks to force TikTok to be divested from ByteDance due to national security concerns.
Legislators and data-privacy experts have expressed concerns that US user data could easily be compromised by the Chinese government, as ByteDance is based in China.
TikTok has consistently denied such claims, but that has not stopped local, state and federal politicians from trying to put guardrails on the platform out of national security concerns.
During his first term in office, Mr Trump also voiced worries about the Chinese-owned social media app, but during his 2024 presidential campaign, he joined TikTok and quickly gained millions of followers.
His initial 2024 opponent, President Joe Biden, who also signed the bipartisan legislation that could ultimately ban TikTok, also joined the platform.
At a news conference on Monday, president-elect Mr Trump promised to "take a look" at the coming deadline that might see TikTok banned.
"I do have a warm spot for TikTok in my heart," he said, pointing out that he believed his popularity on the platform might have helped him to win younger voters during the 2024 election.
Mr Trump stopped short of any specifics as to how he might prevent the app from being banned in the US and his options might be limited.
He could try to convince Congress to repeal the legislation, but that seems unlikely as it received bipartisan support.
It's not yet clear how long it will take the US Supreme Court to decide on the case, which is one of the few remaining options ByteDance has to save the app's presence in the US.
Just last week, US politicians sent letters to Apple and Google, notifying the technology giants that on January 19, if ByteDance divest TikTok from its portfolio, that the popular video sharing app would have to be removed from app stores.
The US is one of TikTok's largest markets, with more than 175 million active monthly users by many estimates.
India was once the platform's biggest market, with more than 200 million monthly users, before the app was banned in that country for similar national security reasons.
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Capoue 45' 1
21 Lessons for the 21st Century
Yuval Noah Harari, Jonathan Cape
History's medical milestones
1799 - First small pox vaccine administered
1846 - First public demonstration of anaesthesia in surgery
1861 - Louis Pasteur published his germ theory which proved that bacteria caused diseases
1895 - Discovery of x-rays
1923 - Heart valve surgery performed successfully for first time
1928 - Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin
1953 - Structure of DNA discovered
1952 - First organ transplant - a kidney - takes place
1954 - Clinical trials of birth control pill
1979 - MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging, scanned used to diagnose illness and injury.
1998 - The first adult live-donor liver transplant is carried out
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
The specs
Engine: four-litre V6 and 3.5-litre V6 twin-turbo
Transmission: six-speed and 10-speed
Power: 271 and 409 horsepower
Torque: 385 and 650Nm
Price: from Dh229,900 to Dh355,000
Turkish Ladies
Various artists, Sony Music Turkey
Guns N’ Roses’s last gig before Abu Dhabi was in Hong Kong on November 21. We were there – and here’s what they played, and in what order. You were warned.
- It’s So Easy
- Mr Brownstone
- Chinese Democracy
- Welcome to the Jungle
- Double Talkin’ Jive
- Better
- Estranged
- Live and Let Die (Wings cover)
- Slither (Velvet Revolver cover)
- Rocket Queen
- You Could Be Mine
- Shadow of Your Love
- Attitude (Misfits cover)
- Civil War
- Coma
- Love Theme from The Godfather (movie cover)
- Sweet Child O’ Mine
- Wichita Lineman (Jimmy Webb cover)
- Wish You Were Here (instrumental Pink Floyd cover)
- November Rain
- Black Hole Sun (Soundgarden cover)
- Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door (Bob Dylan cover)
- Nightrain
Encore:
- Patience
- Don’t Cry
- The Seeker (The Who cover)
- Paradise City
