By
Svetlana Soroka
April 18th, 2024
Drawing on the potential for more aggressive buyouts by Musk, Twitter investors are refusing to sit on the sidelines and watch the shares climb to a whole new pedestal.
The shares of American microblogging and social networking service, Twitter Inc (NYSE: TWTR) have grown by more than 24% in the Pre-Market today following the details of a 13G filing with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) showing Elon Musk, the Chief Executive Officer of the electric automaker, Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) has acquired a 9.2% stake in the social media company.
The filing showed that Musk acquired exactly 73,486,938 shares of Twitter worth about $2.48 billion based on the company’s closing price after Friday’s trading session. The new acquisition places Musk as the single largest external shareholder in the San Francisco-based social media outfit.
Elon Musk’s investment in Twitter comes as a very big surprise seeing the vocal CEO is a staunch critic of the microblogging platform. Barely 2 weeks ago, Elon Musk bemoaned the biased role of Twitter to give easy access to free speeches on the platform, asking his followers what could be done.
“Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy. What should be done?” he said via a tweet shared on March 26th.
Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy.
What should be done? https://t.co/aPS9ycji37
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 26, 2022
His general distaste for the modalities in which Twitter manages people’s interactions has even made Elon Musk consider creating a social media of his own. Based on these events, the investment in Twitter has been considered a move that may be multi-faceted and set to be unraveled in the nick of time.
“Musk could try to take a more aggressive stance here on Twitter,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said Monday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” “This eventually could lead to some sort of buyout…This makes sense given what Musk has at least been talking about, at least from a social media perspective.”
The buyout argument sounds tenable as many in the ecosystem agree that one of the viable ways to change a product is by owning it, and Musk’s push into the social media scene may lend credence to this narrative.
Twitter Shares Closes in on ATH Per the Elon Musk News
Drawing on the potential for more aggressive buyouts by the iconic SpaceX founder, Twitter investors are refusing to sit on the sidelines and watch the shares climb to a whole new pedestal.
The company’s investors’ aggressive accumulation has pushed the shares to $47.18 and it is notably on a massive uplift to retest its All-Time High (ATH) of $77.63 at a time when tech stocks are taking a very big beating.
Becoming a part-owner of Twitter also comes as a twist as Musk has fallen into a number of troubles with regulators for tweeting statements that hurt Tesla’s shareholders as a whole. In one of such tweets, Musk said he has received funding to take Tesla private at $420 per share, stirring an unprecedented market reaction that eventually led to the SEC’s crackdown and the removal of Musk as the company’s chairman at the time.