Asian Tech Press (Sep 3) -- It is said Wednesday evening that ByteDance, the most popular non-gaming app worldwide TikTok's parent company, plans to sell its securities business this year, with an overall valuation of 500 million to 1 billion yuan ($77 million to $155 million).

The report said that ByteDance has made a clear internal decision that it will not engage in the securities business in the future.

The sale is planned to start in the first half of 2021, and ByteDance has communicated with China International Capital Corporation (CICC), CITIC Securities Co., Ltd., Fosun Holdings Limited, Niuguwang and East Money Information Co., Ltd., among which two companies have given their investment intention letters.

The securities business under ByteDance contains two parts: platform products and Hong Kong and U.S. stock business. Among them, the main platform product is Haitun Gupiao, which is translated to Dolphin Stocks, a stock trading software, which has been online for 4 years and currently has 133,900 daily active users.

The Hong Kong and U.S. stock business is undertaken by Songshu Zhengquan, or Squirrel Securities, which was incorporated in Hong Kong at the end of 2019, and Hengxing Zhengquan, or Stellar Securities, a company renamed from Hong Kong brokerage Asia-Pacific Securities, which was acquired by TikTok owner in March this year.

ByteDance responded that the company is shrinking its finance-related businesses, and "does have plans to sell its securities business." The response did not specify, however, which assets were included in the sale.

(US$1 = 6.4591 yuan)