TikTok, US tax sting on (non-transferable) employee shares
Multi-million dollar tax burdens for managers and former managers of the Chinese platform that the US government has backed into a corner
1' min read
1' min read
TikTok executives in the US have been saddled with multimillion-dollar tax liabilities on shares they have failed to sell, at a time when the Chinese-owned social is battling a potential US ban. ByteDance, the Beijing-based parent company of the app, is facing backlash from US employees due to a share allocation programme that prevents them from cashing out and leaves them exposed to a huge potential tax bill, the Financial Times reveals. And so TikTok finds itself in one of the most delicate moments in its history. The US Senate is considering a bill that would force the app to be sold for national security reasons or banned.
In particular, Nnete Matima, who quit his job as sales manager of TikTok in August, said he was on the verge of paying a 'potentially substantial' tax bill. There are people who have a six-figure tax bill on income they never received,' he said. One such person is Patrick Spaulding Ryan, who worked at ByteDance as a manager between 2020 and 2022, and owes a tax bill of over $100,000 on shares he failed to sell. All this while TikTok is in a difficult position internationally.
