Like it or not, Elon Musk is the new owner of Twitter. The richest man in the world, head of SpaceX and Tesla, therefore signed Thursday at the end of the day to offer himself, not without some resentment, the social network of which he is one of the main actors.
The agreement, announced last spring, had to be signed this Friday before 11:00 p.m. (French time) to avoid a costly trial of Elon Musk. For 44 billion dollars, the new boss of the blue bird takes over a platform that he has not stopped criticizing for several months.
Fake accounts at the heart of the conflict
Everything had started well: in early April, Elon Musk announced an equity acquisition of just over 9% of the social network. After initially wanting to join the board of directors, the capricious billionaire hastens on by announcing his intention to buy the social network for $44 billion. The offer is accepted by Twitter.
But the honeymoon slowly turns sour when the future boss begins to doubt the number of fake accounts posted on Twitter. At the beginning of July his sentence fell: he resigned from the takeover bid on the pretext that Twitter had not respected the commitments made in the agreement.
It is then that a legal battle begins between Musk and the company, financially weakened by the episode. In reality, the arguments of the head of SpaceX to try to disassociate himself are crumbling, one after another, and in mid-October a particularly expensive trial for him was announced.
What future for Twitter?
Did Twitter mislead Musk about the number of fake accounts? In the background, the US media assumes that Tesla’s exit from the stock market, whose shares were going to be used to finance the operation, was the real reason for the withdrawal.
Still, in another twist, Elon Musk finally agreed, not without some bitterness, to buy Twitter on October 4, before the final signing on October 27.
It remains to be seen what she will do with her new baby, whose moderation she regularly criticizes is too strict for her taste. “Twitter takeover is an accelerator to create X, the all-purpose app,” she said in early October. In all likelihood, she hopes to turn it into a full-fledged app on China’s WeChat model, where Internet users can communicate, get information, or even exchange money.
Source: BFM TV
