TikTok. Photo: VCG

Oracle Corp affirmed Monday it is part of the proposal submitted by TikTok owner ByteDance to the US Treasury Department over the weekend in which the US software firm "will serve as the trusted technology provider," according to a company statement.

"Oracle has a 40-year track record providing secure, highly performant technology solutions," read the statement, which confirmed US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin's statement earlier in the day.

Oracle's stock on NASDAQ was halted shortly after opening higher on Monday and continued that trend when shares resumed trading about an hour later.

The Trump administration received Oracle's proposal and will review the plan this week, Mnuchin said on Monday.

"We have a lot of confidence in both Microsoft and Oracle, they've chosen Oracle, we'll be reviewing it with their technical teams and our technical teams to see if they can make the representations" to keep data on US phones safe, Mnuchin told CNBC. 

Trump said last week that the firm only has until Tuesday (September 15) to find a buyer. His August executive order set September 20 for closing the deal.

Oracle's proposal might not come to fruition, Liu Dingding, an independent tech analyst in Beijing, told the Global Times on Monday.

Facebook would be the best buyer of TikTok's US operations, but wouldn't get regulatory approval considering its antitrust woes, Liu said.

China firmly supports ByteDance's legal rights and interests, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Monday, in response to the reported TikTok buyout.

China has repeatedly stated its position on the forced sale of TikTok, saying it is a government coercive action, Wang Wenbin, a spokesperson of the Chinese foreign ministry, told a regular briefing on Monday.

Microsoft was told it was out of the running to buy TikTok on Sunday.  "ByteDance let us know today they would not be selling TikTok's US operations to Microsoft," a Microsoft blog noted on Sunday. "We are confident our proposal would have been good for TikTok's users, while protecting national security interests," Microsoft said.

Global Times