By
Bhushan Akolkar
April 24th, 2024
Following his takeover of Twitter, Elon Musk has sold 19.5 million more Twitter shares worth $3.95 billion.
According to reports, Elon Musk sold an additional $3.95 billion worth of Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) shares following the closure of his $44 billion Twitter (NYSE: TWTR) acquisition. Filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reveal that the Tesla chief executive sold 19.5 million more shares of the electric vehicle maker. Before offloading the shares, Elon Musk owned roughly 25% of Tesla in stock and options.
Elon Musk Sold Tesla Shares at Higher Value in 2021
Last year when Tesla stock jumped 50%, Musk sold close to $22 billion worth of shares. However, shares of the electric vehicle maker are currently trading down 46% year-to-date, compared to the Nasdaq Composite’s 33% decline.
In 2022, Elon Musk sold a combined $15 billion worth of stocks between April and August. And although the Tesla stock drawdown this year has substantially eroded his fortune, Musk is still the world’s wealthiest person. According to Forbes, his current net worth is nearly $200 billion.
On August 9th, Elon Musk informed fans that he would desist from further selling Twitter shares to bankroll a possible acquisition. According to the outspoken billionaire businessman at the time:
“In the (hopefully unlikely) event that Twitter forces this deal to close *and* some equity partners don’t come through, it is important to avoid an emergency sale of Tesla stock.”
At the time, Musk was also in a litigious battle with Twitter over his decision to walk away from the deal.
Recap of Musk Twitter Deal
Musk eventually closed the deal to acquire social media giant Twitter on October 28th. In order to finance the deal, he injected millions of his own capital in addition to equity and debt financing from a wide range of sources. Musk’s equity investors include prominent crypto exchange Binance, Ron Baron’s BAMCO, and Prince Alwaleed bin Talal bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia. Leading venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and even former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey are also reportedly part of the investor package.
Terms of the acquisition saw the previously-mentioned partners flat-out financing the deal or rolling their existing shares into Musk’s holding company.
Since officially assuming control of Twitter, Musk has transplanted more than 50 Tesla engineers to the microblogging platform. This crossover is so they can carry out code reviews and other work as the Tesla CEO begins to effect changes.
At a recent conference, Musk stated that his workload substantially increased following the Twitter acquisition. According to him, it went up from “78 hours a week to probably 120”. However, the business executive also explained that things would get much easier once “Twitter is set on the right path”. Musk further stated that Twitter should be much easier to manage than his other companies.
Musk is yet to announce who Twitter’s new chief executive will be, only suggesting that his self-appointed role is temporary. He currently serves as “Chief Twit” and sole director of the social media giant.
