Elon Musk launches hostile bid for Twitter claiming free-speech concerns
CBC
The on-again, off-again relationship between Elon Musk and Twitter took a new twist on Thursday as the world's richest person made a hostile bid to buy up the whole company for more than $43 billion US.
In a regulatory filing, Twitter revealed that Musk has offered to buy up all outstanding shares in the company for $54.20 US a share. With 800 million shares available, that values the company at just over $43 billion US.
Speaking at the TED conference in Vancouver on Thursday, Musk said his motivations are not financial but rather come from a desire to preserve the "public square" that Twitter has become.
"This is not a way to make money.... I don't care about the economics at all," he said.
"This is just my strong, intuitive sense ... that having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization," Musk, the CEO of Tesla, said.
"The truth matters to me, a lot," he said of his motives. "Sort of pathologically, it matters to me."
The move is the latest development in the month-long saga between Musk and Twitter, after it emerged in early April that he had quietly bought up more than 73 million shares in the company — more than any other single person or entity owns.
That led to him being invited to join the company's board of directors, but that overture fell apart days later.
Musk called his hostile takeover offer his "best and final price" for the company, but he acknowledged that the deal is far from certain.
Investors seem to think the deal is very much in doubt, as the shares are trading at $45 apiece on Thursday, well below Musk's offer price.
"Investors are not expecting another offer or a bidding war," said Colin Cieszynski, a strategist at SIA Wealth Management in Toronto.
Daniel Ives, an analyst at Wedbush Securities in New York, told CBC News in an email that he thinks it could take between 30 and 45 days for the process to sort itself out, but ultimately he thinks Musk will be successful.
"This soap opera will end with Musk owning Twitter after this aggressive hostile takeover of the company," Ives said.
The multi-billionaire has been a vocal critic of Twitter in recent weeks, mostly over his belief that it falls short on free-speech principles.
