After finishing purchasing a majority share in Twitter just a week ago and then declining a seat on the company’s Board of Directors, Elon Musk has announced that he’s made an offer to purchase all remaining shares of the platform.
“I invested in Twitter as I believe in its potential to be the platform for free speech around the globe,” Musk began in a letter he also shared on, well, Twitter that was addressed to its chair of the board of directors, Bret Taylor.
“However, since making that investment, I now realize the company will neither thrive nor serve this societal imperative in its current form. Twitter needs to be transformed as a private company.” He also added that Twitter “has extraordinary potential. I will unlock it.” The letter also outlined his cash offer, which was $54.20 per share. That would value Twitter at $43.39 billion if the sale were to happen.
The company made a press release acknowledging the offer, adding that it was an “unsolicited, non-binding proposal from Elon Musk,” and have said, “The Twitter Board of Directors will carefully review the proposal to determine the course of action that it believes is in the best interest of the Company and all Twitter stockholders.” This purchase could very well happen, and Musk said it was his “best and final offer.”
Elon’s sudden call to “transform” Twitter came just days after shareholders filed a suit against Musk for alleged shady practices regarding his initial Twitter stock purchases. Marc Bain Rasella filed a class-action lawsuit against Musk in New York representing investors who sold Twitter stock between March 24 and April 1.
He is being accused of securities fraud for not disclosing that he was buying these shares within the legal time frame. Musk was supposed to disclose to the Securities and Exchange Commission within ten days of when he bought more than 5% of Twitter’s stock but didn’t disclose that information until 11 more days after that deadline passed. The suit has theorized that Musk did that to “acquire shares of Twitter less expensively,” because the share price would have, and did indeed, spike when it was revealed.
“Investors who sold shares of Twitter stock between March 24, 2022, when Musk was required to have disclosed his Twitter ownership, and before the actual April 4, 2022 disclosure, missed the resulting share price increase as the market reacted to Musk’s purchases and were damaged hereby,” the suit explained.
Some predicted that a takeover was looming after Musk passed up his chance for a board seat, and Musk’s criticisms in his letter have lined up with critical comments he’s made and questions he’s posed about the platform in polls through the past weeks. Most of his critical posts have been deleted, but one still remains where he posed the question “Is Twitter Dying?” to his followers.
