The news: President Donald Trump said that he has found “very wealthy people” to buy TikTok and would reveal more in the coming weeks, further chipping away at fears that the app will be banned in the US after he extended the forced sale deadline multiple times.

Meanwhile, TikTok’s swath of new features and presence at Cannes Lions signaled that the platform isn’t overly worried about the potential of a US ban. TikTok is currently testing “bulletins,” an Instagram Channels-like feature that lets creators and brands directly message their followers. Chatter about the ban was muted at Cannes, overshadowed in part by high profile AI feature announcements.

The damage: After much anxiety at the start of the year, TikTok’s looming ban still hasn’t gone away—but concern that the app could be permanently blocked is beginning to fade. While that’s obviously good news for TikTok, the uncertainty has still left an impact on its business.

TikTok CPMs fell by as much as 80% in January 2025 as the first ban took hold, per AdRoll estimates. Its two biggest short-form video competitors, YouTube and Meta, stood to gain as much as 50% of ad dollars reallocated from TikTok. While advertisers are unlikely to abandon TikTok entirely, uncertainty has driven spending and user activity to its competitors.