What We Know as Elon Musk Closes his Deal to Buy Twitter

Elon Musk Closes his Deal to Buy Twitter. Today is the morning after a significant day for the majority of market watchers or even casual readers of headlines over the past few years: Elon Musk, renowned space entrepreneur, prolific and controversial tweeter, and richest man in the world, has finally completed the acquisition of social media platform Twitter.

Here is the information you, along with Musk’s 110 million followers, need to know about the deal as it develops.

In fewer than 280 characters, Elon Musk declared that he would be the new owner of Twitter.

Musk, a frequent critic of foreign regulators, swiftly received a response to that tweet from Thierry Breton, the commissioner for internal markets of the European Union.

When did Elon close his deal to buy Twitter?

After months of legal fighting and public strife, numerous news agencies claimed late Thursday that Musk had finalized the $44 billion transaction and dismissed top officials, including the CEO of the business Parag Agrawal.

Bret Taylor, the CEO of Twitter, changed his Twitter bio to remove that title.

Musk may need to pay as much as $200 million to fired executives

Agrawal, the director of legal, Ned Segal, the chief financial officer, and Vijaya Gadde, the director of policy and trust, all had detailed contracts outlining what would happen in the event of a takeover.

According to MarketWatch, the three hold approximately $65 million in Twitter shares and would receive an additional $119.6 million in stock if their employment were to end.

“Gadde is expected to leave Twitter with the largest sum of money in total: around $74 million. However, Agrawal and Segal aren’t far behind her, with respective earnings of about $65 million and $66 million “As per MarketWatch.

Will Elon Musk fire more Twitter workers?

By the end of 2023, Twitter’s former management had already planned to decrease infrastructure spending significantly, including data centers, and reduce employment by around $800 million.

Before the transaction was finalized, there were rumors of stricter policies implemented by Musk, including the firing of 75% of the company’s 7,500 employees. According to people familiar with the situation, Musk assured Twitter employees on Wednesday “that he doesn’t aim to slash 75% of the personnel when he takes over the firm,” Bloomberg said.

What did Elon Musk buy Twitter for?

Musk ultimately paid his first bid amount, which works out to about $44 billion or $54.20 per share.

The sum was a 33% premium over Twitter’s stock price at the time of his April offer. But since then, the corporation has been hurt by a crash in IT stocks, record-high inflation that is pinching investors, and a looming recession.

Although Twitter had ended at $53.70 at the end of trading on Thursday, a significant increase from its low point of $32.65 in July post-bid, Musk has been vociferous about overpaying for the acquisition.

Musk previously claimed that while it is clear that he and other investors are paying too much for Twitter right now, “the long-term potential for Twitter is an order of magnitude larger than its current worth.”

Why does Elon Musk want Twitter?

The agreement gives the wealthy Tesla shareholder influence over one of the planet’s most potent megaphones.

Additionally, it offers Musk access to almost 400 million users’ data and the power to reinstate individuals and groups that Twitter had previously blocked or marginalized, including former President Donald Trump.

Who will run Twitter now?

Currently, it seems like Musk is in charge of Twitter.

He revived a meme that has been part of internet mythology for years on Wednesday by changing his Twitter bio to “Chief Twit” just before entering Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters while carrying a porcelain sink. Let that sink in, he wrote in a tweet.

Is Donald Trump coming back to Twitter?

The Tesla billionaire is likely to lift a permanent ban on Trump for inciting violence during the attack on the Capitol on January 6 now that he is in charge of Twitter.

Trump has more than 88 million followers on the social networking site, and Musk has said he would let him return.

According to court documents, Musk contacted Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal in April, saying it “would be fantastic to remove permanent bans, save for spam accounts and those that explicitly encourage violence.”

Musk stated: “I do think it was not correct to ban Donald Trump, I think that was a mistake” during a conference in May.

Will Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter mean more hate, and extremism online?

Elon Musk promised to “unlock” Twitter’s potential to become “the platform for free speech throughout the globe” when he first agreed to buy the social media network in April.

Musk has referred to himself as a “free speech absolutist” and expressed alarm over the way Twitter moderates its users. Musk, who finalized the $44 billion acquisition on Friday following a protracted court battle, has branded himself as one.

Will Musk follow through on his vow to relax content filtering policies in the cause of “free speech” now that he owns Twitter?

In a message to advertisers on Thursday, Musk said he didn’t want the website to become into “a free-for-all hellscape where anything can be said with no consequences.” Analysts have speculated that the advertisers may be put off by the Tesla CEO’s attitude toward free speech.

Musk stated in a message shared on Twitter that “our platform must be friendly and welcoming to all, where you may choose your preferred experience according to your preferences, in addition to abiding by the laws of the land.”

Musk has been under fire for allegedly allowing offensive or extreme speech on the website, and experts have raised worry that lowering content control standards could have negative effects in the real world.

Meanwhile, conservatives have praised Musk’s takeover of Twitter as many claims that social media networks often restrict their opinions and views.

How will advertisers respond to Twitter with less moderation?

Elon Musk, a self-described “free speech absolutist,” has argued for less content control on Twitter ever since he initially revealed his plans to take over the business in April.

At the TED2022 conference in April, Musk stated, “We want to have the perception and the reality that communication is as free as possible. Is it OK for someone you dislike to say something you find offensive? If so, then we have the right to free speech.

The concept appears to have roots in Twitter’s early years; in the early 2010s, former CEO Dick Costolo referred to the platform as the “free-speech wing of the free-speech party.”

In order to prevent misinformation, hate speech, and disinformation, Twitter has since implemented stronger regulations. Targeted harassment, COVID-19 misinformation, and electoral manipulation are prohibited by the platform’s guidelines.

Advertisers have expressed concern in response to Musk’s comments on loosening some Twitter rules around free speech.

Musk tweeted that Twitter “clearly cannot become a free-for-all-hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences” shortly after the Wall Street Journal published an article regarding Madison Avenue’s worries.

The company’s main source of income, advertisers, were the target of Musk’s post.

According to Ari Lightman, a professor of digital media and marketing at Carnegie Mellon University, social networks are working to remove bigoted, antisemitic, and patently false information. Advertisers are concerned about that.

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Conclusion

After months of legal battling over the deal, he fired top employees, including the company’s CEO Parag Agrawal. Elon Musk has guaranteed the 7,500 employees at Twitter that he will not fire as many as 75% of them. The cost of the microblogging platform acquisition by the electric car manufacturer was approximately $44 billion, or $54.20 per share. The person who recently took over Twitter, Elon Musk, has advocated for less content censorship on the website. According to the self-described “free speech absolutist,” people should have the freedom to decide what kinds of content they find offensive or not.