Elon Musk Acquires Twitter With a Striking $44 Billion Offer
Tesla founder and billionaire Elon Musk is set to purchase Twitter in a deal worth nearly $44 billion.
Musk, the world’s wealthiest person, has a 9% stake in the company. In a recent Twitter post he stated, “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…Twitter has tremendous potential-I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it.”
BREAKING: Elon Musk buys Twitter for $44 billion, the company will go private.
— Brian Tyler Cohen (@briantylercohen) April 25, 2022
When considering the financial aspect of the company, he recently stated, “Having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization. I don’t care about the economics at all.”
Concerns about the political power of the site reached the White House, which declined to comment on the deal. Many accuse the platform of being involved in the storming of the U.S. Capitol in January 2021. White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, commented on the role of social media, stating, “Our concerns are not new. The president has long talked about his concerns about the power of social media platforms, including Twitter and others, to spread misinformation.”
🚀💫♥️ Yesss!!! ♥️💫🚀 pic.twitter.com/0T9HzUHuh6
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 25, 2022
The deal was approved by Twitter’s board in a unanimous vote, which includes Twitter’s co-founder, Jack Dorsey. The controversial CEO has mentioned easing content restrictions and getting rid of bot accounts as goals for the platform. Aside from Tesla, Musk is well-known for creating PayPal, which he sold to eBay in 2002 for $1.2 billion, and SpaceX, his space exploration technology company.
