Elon Musk Will Buy Twitter For $44B

Twitter and Elon Musk finalized a deal for the Tesla CEO to buy the social media giant, Twitter announced Monday.

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Musk will pay $54.20 per share, or around $44 billion, to acquire the company and take it private.

The New York Times reported late Sunday that Twitter was nearing a deal to accept the Tesla CEO’s bid, and that a deal could be announced as soon as Monday. Reuters reported Monday morning that Twitter was “poised to agree to a sale” to Musk.

The news comes after weeks of back and forth regarding the future of Twitter. Musk obtained a 9.2 percent stake in the company and was appointed to its board of directors before declining the board seat. He then put in an offer to buy the company for around $43 billion.

Musk has openly criticized Twitter and believes he can improve the social media company through private ownership.

“Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” Musk said in a statement. “I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it.”

Twitter showed some pushback to Musk’s unsolicited bid to buy the company and implemented a “poison pill,” which would allow shareholders to buy additional shares at a discounted price if any entity or person acquires 15 percent or more of the company without board approval, in response to Musk’s bid nearly two weeks ago. But the board of directors ultimately voted unanimously to accept Musk’s offer.

The deal is expected to close later this year.

Illustration: Tesla Owners Club Belgium Creative Commons photo