Not well versed in any of this, but could this be Musk just toying around with Twitter and/or him bluffing to get a reaction? Does he have any legal obligation to go through with the purchase if Twitter was open to it?
I have no idea why Twitter would agree to that. It seems to me the more likely outcome is that Musk will use lawsuits as a disincentive to prevent Twitter from forcing him to go through with the deal, and he will back out at the cost of a massive penalty payment.
If I had to speculate: a) Twitter is not obligated to provide this data to Musk (he waived his right to due diligence, after all); b) Musk appears to be trying as hard as he can to wriggle out of the deal, whether by renegotiating to a lower sales price or finding some loophole to extricate himself for the other; and c) there's no real upside to providing the data to Musk.
If this went to court, Musk definitely has the weaker legal position here: he signed a deal that obligates him to buy Twitter at a certain price contingent pretty much only on being able to actually obtain financing, and (despite recent market events), that financing doesn't look hard for him to get.
Did anyone think he would actually be allowed to buy it? Twitter, as a weapon for propaganda and a tool for information collection, is too important and powerful to just let someone like Musk do what he wants with it.
So why would he buy Twitter? No one thinks its going to be a good investment. It was kind of a prerequisite to have shareholders agree to the purchase. There's no conceivable reason for him to spend his time, effort and money in buying twitter apart from his stated purpose. He's going to lose money and time on it. And its a stretch to think his personal wealth or companies will benefit from Musk owning Twitter. So if no other plausible explanation as to why he wants to buy twitter, why not just take him at face value?
This is absolutely pure speculation, but perhaps that is Musk's motive for this whole charade. He is erratic enough that it certainly seems possible that he did this whole acquisition agreement with no intention of following through simply to unveil information to discredit Twitter. It certainly doesn't appear from the outside that Musk had any ideas for making money on this by materially improving Twitter as a business from anything I've read. The justifications about free speech seem to taint this deal with Musk having an ideological bent to the whole transaction, so it seems possible that he thought he could use the buyout to access damaging information (like potentially lying on SEC filings) and then back out without spending the full amount.
Honestly, waiving due-diligence is so sketchy that it has made me wonder from the start what his true endgame was. If he did want to buy the company, what did he gain by waiving his due-diligence rights?
You mean Musk agreed to buy Twitter contingent on financing and now is trying to torpedo his own financing after he himself agreed to the sale? There's a lot of talk of fraud in the comments here, but to me _that_ sounds like fraud on Musk's part.
In any case, I guess we'll have to see if Musk's financing really gets pulled and if that really means Musk is off the hook.
Musk realizes that his entire wealth and image is propped up by social media and hype so he buys Twitter. I wouldn't be surprised if he himself was funding bots and influencers to hype him and his companies.
Musk was forced to buy Twitter for one reason and for one reason only: because he himself signed the agreement to do so. He offered that kind of money. At no point was there anyone else forcing Musk to buy, or forcing him to skip due diligence. That's all on Musk and on Musk only.
My guess is Musk wants to punish them for making him go through with the deal _he agreed to_. He doesn't want to own Twitter and he's making them feel it.
As best I’ve been able to discern it, Musk said he was going to buy Twitter for a way overvalued sum ($44bn) as a troll? But ended up getting in so deep that he found himself with a legal obligation to buy the thing for an absurd price.
It’s the explanation that makes the most sense to me: obscenely rich man is very used to doing whatever the hell he wants with no repercussions, particularly when shitposting on Twitter (see: SEC) and there was no-one around to tell him to stop.
Yes, but even if they take him to court, it's highly likely that Musk and his legal team drag this out. It's not going to be a simple case. No contract law case ever is. And at that point, Twitter's business might keep suffering, to the point that their fair market value plummets, and they enter a very difficult financial situation. Then Musk can swoop in with a much lower price offer and they will accept simply due to their financial position and not being able or willing to continue the case in the courts. I think Musk will end up buying Twitter but at a much lower price.
Musk made them an offer with contingencies. If they're not providing data to meet the contingencies, they're defaulting for whatever reason, including possibly that they misrepresented their product. If they do provide data, and the contingencies aren't met, there is no deal, as they misrepresented their product. If they provide data, and the contingencies are met, Musk would be in default to not close. There is chance Musk was bluffing, but it seems likely the other way around. I don't know how it could be that Twitter would think Musk wouldn't check to verify what he was purchasing. Seems a huge waste of time.
I suspect that Musk was willing to purchase Twitter if legitimate, and knew if Twitter was fraudulent, this process would shed light on it. If the deal is void due to Twitter misrepresenting itself, Musk can invest in a legitimate venture instead.
I don't see a whole lot of reason for speculation. The deal will close, or it will not. Chances are, Musk wasn't kidding when he made the offer, which means if it doesn't close, Twitter misrepresented itself.
Wonder how much Twitter stock Musk is buying now, while the price is low.
That'd be a fun one: he gets ordered to buy the stock at some price between current and original agreement, and already owns more than half of it. Would he then have to go back and pay extra for the stock bought in the interim?
The chance of Musk owning Twitter was the end of the world to a lot of people just a few months ago; I don't hear many of them voicing their relief that the deal might not go through now.
Musk has a history of making public, bad-faith declarations to pump assets he later sells at profit.
More than one person has pointed out that Musk likely wanted to sell his Twitter stock, and was using the official-looking, low-ball buy offer to pump it. Twitter board smartly called his bluff, and now Musk is trying to weasel his way out of paying anything.
Musk famously does not care about contracts. Note that the only reason he ended up buying Twitter is that Deleware's corporate courts really don't fuck around and were likely going to force him to buy it pronto despite his attempts to wriggle out. But he'll happily screw over lesser people, as he's doing with various vendors, like Twitter's landlords: https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-landlord-sues-compan...
Explain to me how a small software vendor, even with the best contract in the world, is going to force Musk to turn back on their access in a timely enough fashion that they'll still have a business left? And be able to do it for a modest enough amount of money that the ISV will still be turning a profit?
Taking into account Elon Musk is limited in the amount of stock he can sell from Tesla, the first conclusion is he does not have the money to buy Twitter.
I actually think it's probably pretty simple underneath the facade - Musk offered to buy Twitter for a lot of money. The market tanked and Musk doesn't want to pay that price any more. He thinks he can strong-arm Twitter and either not go through with the purchase or force them to accept a lower price. The law does not support this, but Musk has a history of being unbothered by the law and there are examples (not Musk) where this tactic has worked to reduce the purchase price by hundreds of millions of dollars.
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