The Trump administration is poised to receive a roughly $10 billion "brokerage" fee from the investor group that recently took control of TikTok's U.S. operations, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal. The payment, which President Trump has previously referred to as a "fee-plus," represents a windfall for the Treasury Department in exchange for facilitating the deal that allowed the social media app to continue operating in the United States. The extraction of this fee marks a significant departure from traditional U.S. regulatory involvement in private-sector transactions. Typically, advisory fees for even the largest mergers, such as Union Pacific Corporation (NYSE:UNP) $71.5 billion acquisition of Norfolk Southern Corporation (NYSE:NSC), result in bank payouts that are a fraction of the percentage claimed by the government in the TikTok deal.