The billionaire tweeted “this deal cannot move forward” unless Twitter provides proof of its claims, reiterating his own view that the ratio is far higher.
Musk’s latest online pronouncement complicates an already chaotic takeover, potentially one of the largest acquisitions the internet industry has ever seen.
Twitter’s shares fell another 3.2% in pre-market trading in New York, after sliding more than 8% the previous day. The spread between Musk’s offer price of $54.20 and its last trading price is currently about 40%, suggesting investors think there is little chance the deal will get done without a discount -- if at all.
Twitter said it is “committed to completing the transaction on the agreed price and terms as promptly as practicable,” in a statement on Tuesday.
“If a revised deal does get done by Musk and Twitter,” said Dan Ives, analyst at Wedbush, “it will likely will be at a much lower price once negotiations take over and the diligence happens around Twitter DAU and algorithms hot button issues.
The battle over bots has become a sticking point for Musk, who
Musk encouraged Twitter users to run their own tests for bots, crowd-sourcing the effort to calculate whether they made up less than 5% of the service. Responding to Musk’s assertions, Agrawal posted a long thread laying out his company’s methodology.
The proposed takeover includes a $1 billion breakup fee for each party, which Musk will have to pay if he ends the deal or fails to deliver the acquisition funding as promised. It is unclear whether an update by Twitter on the number of fake accounts -- if materially larger than 5% -- would trigger a so-called material adverse effect clause, releasing Musk from the breakup fee.
The latest barrage of tweets from the world’s richest person is yet another twist in Musk’s attempted takeover of the micro-blogging site. A prolific user with over 90 million followers, he revealed a
Musk caused the potential cracks in the deal to
(Update with additional context, response from Twitter, analyst comment. Earlier version corrected deal price.)
--With assistance from
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