Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has now reversed course from his previous refusals and now announced his intention to once again buy Twitter for $54.20 per share, prompting authorities to freeze trading in the social media company’s stock.
According to a Bloomberg article from Tuesday, Musk made the request in a letter to Twitter management.
In the wake of the announcement, stock prices rose by up to 18%.
Twitter has been fighting Musk in court for weeks over his effort to withdraw an earlier $44 billion deal to buy the firm.
Musk has voiced worry that the true percentage of fake accounts or ‘bots’ on the social media site may be as high as 33%, rather than the company’s officially declared figure of 5%, with a smaller number of monetizable daily active users supporting a lower valuation.
On October 17, a trial to assess the status of the transaction was set.
The Delaware court supervising the merger, Kathaleen McCormick, has given Musk’s attorneys permission to incorporate Peiter Zatko’s whistleblower story in their arguments.
The social media company’s former cybersecurity czar turned whistleblower has alleged that Twitter’s management lacked the resources and drive to identify the real number of bogus accounts operating on the social media site.
In his whistleblower report, Zatko also claimed that one or more present Twitter workers are working for a foreign intelligence organization.
Both parties of the merger case recently deposed Twitter’s former CEO, Jack Dorsey.
Twitter followed other technology businesses earlier this year in aiming to save expenses by suspending hiring and decreasing office space across many countries in response to worsening economic conditions.
Twitter announced losses of $0.08 per share in its second quarter results, falling short of experts’ anticipated $0.14 gain per share.
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