Elon Musk acquires Twitter, Discuss

[MJ DeMarco]

Just announced! Agreement is reached and this deal is going down!

SAN FRANCISCO, April 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Twitter, Inc. (NYSE: TWTR) today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by an entity wholly owned by Elon Musk, for $54.20 per share in cash in a transaction valued at approximately $44 billion. Upon completion of the transaction, Twitter will become a privately held company.

Under the terms of the agreement, Twitter stockholders will receive $54.20 in cash for each share of Twitter common stock that they own upon closing of the proposed transaction. The purchase price represents a 38% premium to Twitter's closing stock price on April 1, 2022, which was the last trading day before Mr. Musk disclosed his approximately 9% stake in Twitter.

Bret Taylor, Twitter's Independent Board Chair, said, "The Twitter Board conducted a thoughtful and comprehensive process to assess Elon's proposal with a deliberate focus on value, certainty, and financing. The proposed transaction will deliver a substantial cash premium, and we believe it is the best path forward for Twitter's stockholders."

Parag Agrawal, Twitter's CEO, said, "Twitter has a purpose and relevance that impacts the entire world. Deeply proud of our teams and inspired by the work that has never been more important."

"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," said Mr. Musk. "I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it."

Transaction Terms and Financing
The transaction, which has been unanimously approved by the Twitter Board of Directors, is expected to close in 2022, subject to the approval of Twitter stockholders, the receipt of applicable regulatory approvals and the satisfaction of other customary closing conditions.

Mr. Musk has secured $25.5 billion of fully committed debt and margin loan financing and is providing an approximately $21.0 billion equity commitment. There are no financing conditions to the closing of the transaction.

For further information regarding all terms and conditions contained in the definitive transaction agreement, please see Twitter's Current Report on Form 8-K, which will be filed in connection with the transaction.

First Quarter 2022 Earnings Results
Twitter plans to release its first quarter fiscal year 2022 results before market open on April 28, 2022. In light of the pending transaction announced today, Twitter will not hold a corresponding conference call.

Advisors
Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC, J.P. Morgan, and Allen & Co. are serving as financial advisors to Twitter, and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Professional Corporation and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP are serving as legal counsel. Morgan Stanley is acting as lead financial advisor to Mr. Musk. BofA Securities and Barclays are also acting as financial advisors. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP is serving as legal counsel.

About Twitter, Inc. (NYSE: TWTR)
Twitter is what's happening and what people are talking about right now. To learn more, visit about.twitter.com and follow @Twitter. Let's talk.

Additional Information and Where to Find It
Twitter, its directors and certain executive officers are participants in the solicitation of proxies from stockholders in connection with the pending acquisition of Twitter (the "Transaction"). Twitter plans to file a proxy statement (the "Transaction Proxy Statement") with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC") in connection with the solicitation of proxies to approve the Transaction. Additional information regarding such participants, including their direct or indirect interests, by security holdings or otherwise, will be included in the Transaction Proxy Statement and other relevant documents to be filed with the SEC in connection with the Transaction. Information relating to the foregoing can also be found in Twitter's definitive proxy statement for its 2022 Annual Meeting of Stockholders (the "2022 Proxy Statement"), which was filed with the SEC on April 12, 2022. To the extent that holdings of Twitter's securities have changed since the amounts printed in the 2022 Proxy Statement, such changes have been or will be reflected on Statements of Change in Ownership on Form 4 filed with the SEC. Promptly after filing the definitive Transaction Proxy Statement with the SEC, Twitter will mail the definitive Transaction Proxy Statement and a WHITE proxy card to each stockholder entitled to vote at the special meeting to consider the Transaction. STOCKHOLDERS ARE URGED TO READ THE TRANSACTION PROXY STATEMENT (INCLUDING ANY AMENDMENTS OR SUPPLEMENTS THERETO) AND ANY OTHER RELEVANT DOCUMENTS THAT TWITTER WILL FILE WITH THE SEC WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE BECAUSE THEY WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION. Stockholders may obtain, free of charge, the preliminary and definitive versions of the Transaction Proxy Statement, any amendments or supplements thereto, and any other relevant documents filed by Twitter with the SEC in connection with the Transaction at the SEC's website (http://www.sec.gov). Copies of Twitter's definitive Transaction Proxy Statement, any amendments or supplements thereto, and any other relevant documents filed by Twitter with the SEC in connection with the Transaction will also be available, free of charge, at Twitter's investor relations website (https://investor.twitterinc.com) or by writing to Twitter, Inc., Attention: Investor Relations, 1355 Market Street, Suite 900, San Francisco, California 94103.

Forward-Looking Statements
This communication contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, including statements regarding: the Transaction, including the expected timing of the closing of the Transaction; considerations taken into account by Twitter's Board of Directors in approving the Transaction; and expectations for Twitter following the closing of the Transaction. If any of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or if any of Twitter's assumptions prove incorrect, Twitter's actual results could differ materially from the results expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Additional risks and uncertainties include those associated with: the possibility that the conditions to the closing of the Transaction are not satisfied, including the risk that required approvals from Twitter's stockholders for the Transaction or required regulatory approvals to consummate the Transaction are not obtained; potential litigation relating to the Transaction; uncertainties as to the timing of the consummation of the Transaction; the ability of each party to consummate the Transaction; possible disruption related to the Transaction to Twitter's current plans and operations, including through the loss of customers and employees; and other risks and uncertainties detailed in the periodic reports that Twitter files with the SEC, including Twitter's Annual Report on Form 10-K filed with the SEC on February 16, 2022, which may be obtained on the investor relations section of Twitter's website (https://investor.twitterinc.com). All forward-looking statements in this communication are based on information available to Twitter as of the date of this communication, and Twitter does not assume any obligation to update the forward-looking statements provided to reflect events that occur or circumstances that exist after the date on which they were made, except as required by law.

Contacts
Investors:
ir@twitter.com

Press:
press@twitter.com

View original content:Elon Musk to Acquire Twitter

SOURCE Twitter, Inc.

 

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[Antifragile]

 

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[Antifragile]

Elon Musk Agrees to Buy Twitter in $44 Billion Deal

Agreement marks the close of a dramatic courtship and a sharp change of heart at the social-media network.

 

[Guest-5ty5s4]

sharp change of heart at the social-media network.

Money talks - bullshit walks.

Exciting new chapter in the world of social media. Let's hope this really is the change for free speech we are expecting.

 

[Mathuin]

Exciting new chapter in the world of social media. Let's hope this really is the change for free speech we are expecting.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

"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," Musk said in the release announcing the deal. "I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential -- I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it."

The big question here is if this: will Twitter get de-wokified? Will culture get a true view of "trending" stories or will the platform still give priority exposure and preference to left-wing fringe nutjobs?

Will it become a better advertising venue?

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

Im sure it is a good feeling for the people who actually care about building something great...


View attachment 46016

When are people going to realize that Twitter was actually a SuperPac that employed thousands of people to do nothing but be activists? Thousands of people making six figures yearly to do nothing but drink lattes, take naps, and ban people they don't agree with.

 

[MitchC]

Governments around the world have already been passing censorship laws, unless he moves this too some sort of decentralised blockchain I think he’s doing to have a lot of problems with governments and also apple and google.

They could remove Twitter from the App Store tomorrow and start pushing their own new social app. Woke Social has a nice ring to it.

Also from what I understand his other businesses rely heavily on government money so that will be interesting.

The thing I’m most excited about is for him to fire 1000s of purple haired devs that have been working from home for 2 years on a social platform that has not changed or innovated for the last 5 years.

I think we missed the biggest scam of all time, dying your hair purple, putting pronouns in your bio and making 200k+ a year to sit at home crying.

Also another thing to consider is that algorithms are there to make platforms more usable/addictive that’s why companies have them. Removing it could make it used less.

And truth social which I haven’t been on is apparently exactly what you’d expect, a bunch of angry right wing people posting “conspiracies”, let’s be honest most people don’t really want to see this sort of thing. Woke stuff is just frustratingly stupid and dumb enough to laugh at but it doesn’t drive you off a platform.

It will be interesting to see how this goes.

I haven’t had a look at twitters ad platform but I don’t know anyone who advertises on there, fixing that and firing useless devs could be enough to turn the platforms profitability around.

 

[MTF]

Lol, love this

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1519036453002653701

View: https://twitter.com/micsolana/status/1519036453002653701?s=21&t=VfNF-O7SSg_QqhMxWCvDMg

 

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[NeoDialectic]

This is incredible. Talk about burning $44B to the ground.

I hope no one remains confused on how families can put so much hate and doubt on their own family members when they try to become entrepreneurs. We are all supposedly entrepreneurs ourselves on here and that hasn't stopped most from immediately doubting.



I'm no Elon fanboy and he may very well still fail at turning the ship around. But he is an accomplished entrepreneur and just look at how much doubt and hate he gets while going through the process from scratch.

It's been like 3 and a half seconds since he took over, will you give him a minute!

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1590384919829962752

View: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1590384919829962752?s=20&t=HR-kAFXj8TA5WmqBb7aTJQ

Sounds like an action plan and advice that would come straight from any top book on business.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

Looks like Twitter refuses to verify the # of bots on the website which they claim is 5%. I'd bet it's more like 25% which is why such extreme, radical viewpoints seem so mainstream.

 

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[heavy_industry]

I couldn't think of a better new owner for Twitter.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Watching the meltdowns on Twitter about Twitter and Elon is about amusing as it gets.

As I stated above, Twitter is the new Trump to hate-- for the media, for partisans, and for the "eat the rich" morons. This means, all rationality and critical thinking goes out the window, and all that remains is hate, envy, and glorious hopes of schadenfreude ... as if Elon has no experience in running a company... out with orange man bad... in with rocket man bad.

Out of curiosity, I've visited Twitter more in the last 7 days than I have in the last 10 years. I'm sure it will survive as some people think it's like watching a trainwreck, other's like me, are genuinely curious in the drama.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1595389099384655873

View: https://twitter.com/mayemusk/status/1595389099384655873?s=20&t=4gwmOuDMEPw2QqAdBauh3w

 

[Aditya Gunjal]

Musk has an amazing track record so far so I think he's going to do good things here. The fight just began though. I can't imagine how hard the left will fight tooth and nail to sink Twitter now. This is the worst thing that could have happened from their perspective though lol. Twitter was a pretty big stronghold.

"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," Musk said in the release announcing the deal. "I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential -- I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it."

The big question here is if this: will Twitter get de-wokified? Will culture get a true view of "trending" stories or will the platform still give priority exposure and preference to left-wing fringe nutjobs?

Will it become a better advertising venue?

This is not a hate post. (And i dont use twitter)
Elon Musk has convinced people that he is their saviour through Public relation campaign.
Much of his image is based on dishonesty.
I think twitter has hell of a data about how people think and other personal data which can be used in various ways(neurolink?). Big data is all someone need to control people and their minds. Why is he interested in social media so much? I think the answer again is data. 44B$ is lot of money someone is going to pay for it (maybe the people themselves) and we all know if we are getting something for free we are the product.
Now about his vison and all, i have read some comments about how workers in his company are overloaded and not paid well. "There are reasons why some astronauts do not agree with his vison and all" and people think its because they are jealous of elon's succes(why the f will someone who has stepped on moon be jealous of someone.
A good criticism on him

View: https://youtu.be/Dkix4UzEbjU

 

[MJ DeMarco]

I think all the sour grapes is because a certain political party no longer has their main narrative engineering platform at their disposal. The largest hivemind will no longer be curated to a particular viewpoint.

So now it is search and destroy.

Sound familiar? Twitter is the new Trump. People don't want Twitter to succeed because it is a threat to the status quo. So if we go by the standard cultural playbook, it will soon be labeled racist, misogynistic, antisemitic and nationalist, if not already.

The partisan playbook is boringly predictable.

He is smoking them all out ha.

View attachment 45954

Since Twitter is all digital, I'm gonna guess it could be run with only 200 people on staff. And Musk knows it.

 

[Fox]

Im sure it is a good feeling for the people who actually care about building something great...

 

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[SDE]

He loved the product and purchased it

 

[MTF]

Maybe I like Elon too much but this move actually makes me want to start using Twitter more and see how I can use it for my business. As a person who generally doesn't like social media, I guess that says a lot about how I believe in Elon LOL.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Done deal.

Elon Musk now in charge of Twitter, CEO and CFO have left, sources say

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has taken control of Twitter, which he agreed to purchase for $44 billion.

www.cnbc.com

 

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[AceVentures]

I love the new Twitter. I bought Twitter blue as soon as he announced it, and I’ve seen so many others do so. All the existing blue checks I’ve seen have also followed suit, despite all the shit they talked. People weren’t mad about impersonations or all the excuses they gave, they were mad that somebody like you and me could pay $8 and have the same privilege as them.

Elon generated a new revenue stream in less than a month of owning the company? And is clearly having fun playing with all the levers he’s got, including firing unproductive employees. I find it funny that the same entrepreneurs that were in other threads agreeing with the quiet quitter generation being lazy, but stand to defend these same phonies once Elon fires them.

Elon has been one of my heroes for a long time and that had been the case among most of my circle too. It truly is funny to see the mainstream flip their bias and see so many blindly follow suit. We were praising him just a couple of years ago, and as soon as he starts rightfully pointing out the political bias in the mainstream he is vilified.

I love Twitter and haven’t found a better platform for coming right up to speed with the happening. “News” is dead so I just check in with high integrity journalists and people I trust to rapidly get a wide ranging set of viewpoints on any topic. Get it straight from the horses mouth instead of waiting 2-3 days to hear a washed up opinionated propagandized NYT write up.

I suspect I’m not the only person that feels this way - because if you’ll note, all the haters are ON Twitter talking shit about it. Imagine gathering all of your friends and going to the public town square to express your discontent with the new public square and not see the irony in what you’re doing - IMO it speaks to just how brainwashed people have become.

Last note: I believe the paid check mark will truly help with bots. The number of scripted bots on TWT is astronomical because there is no cost to their being. This is the same mechanism blockchains use to prevent spam - by introducing a cost to participation you effectively reduce scripted behavior down to more advanced algorithms capable of generating value. (So a highly motivated scammer could still use this method to their advantage, but the troll/propaganda farms that spam our attention with falsehoods go to 0 when you search with filter:verified in your queries.)

 

[MJ DeMarco]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1593828049321361410

View: https://twitter.com/LokayFOX5/status/1593828049321361410


Translation: Twitter can no longer assist in our narrative engineering campaigns, so we won't post it there.

And these "news" organizations wonder why they're dogshit, and no one with an IQ above 90 trusts them.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

With Twitter allowing creators to revenue share, I believe it is heading the right direction.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1621544497388875777

View: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1621544497388875777?s=20&t=iVtdNGyqg7i2aPxP0C9BYA

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

I hope Elon does what I think needs to be done. Not weaponizing digitalization for programming for profit, power and control.

Isn't Elon a big crypto enthusiast? Since that is decentralized, you have to think Twitter will follow similar protocols.

 

[Antifragile]

Maybe I like Elon too much but this move actually makes me want to start using Twitter more and see how I can use it for my business. As a person who generally doesn't like social media, I guess that says a lot about how I believe in Elon LOL.

I’ve re-started using Twitter for this reason. Judge me world. Whatever. I like Elon, and think he’ll make it better. He’ll surely integrate some Crypro/ Blockchain; and I want to be there as a person and for my business.

 

[Silverfox148]

Musk is a big hustler (rightly or wrongly) anyone who doesn't think so, do so at your own peril.
I don't dislike him for a being a good hustler, he seems like a cool person(doesn't mean he is not a hustler).

One of the hunches I have is that Musk has accepted that the institutions are failing/about to fail big in the West and he is positioning himself to have a greater share of the power as traditional institutions become less relevant. He may have been converted to the decentralized/NFT/crypto mindset he isn't the only billionaire lately to have such a conversion.

One of the Weinstein brothers put it this way in a podcast I listened to last year not specifically referring to Musk but to the US billionaires, "The billionaires know the party is ending, and they know the pin~ata is about to be broken and they are positioning themselves to grab the most candy". This sounds about right to me, Twitter is where the culture or at least what remains of it is getting set , the narratives, the movements, etc.

Controlling that gives you a ton of power, especially as a private company , to believe otherwise is naive. Again read the autobiography by Ashley Vance, this guy is not what some are thinking he is. Elon if he actually gains control of Twitter will have a huge influence over the US Government and the policy that it takes towards his business interests when the pin~ata breaks, he is buying a shield/protection. This happens all the time in Latin America in places like Mexico where the billionaires own the mediums via which public discourse/movements form/get fuel.

 

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[Guest-5ty5s4]

I hope no one remains confused on how families can put so much hate and doubt on their own family members when they try to become entrepreneurs. We are all supposedly entrepreneurs ourselves on here and that hasn't stopped most from immediately doubting.

View attachment 45939

I'm no Elon fanboy and he may very well still fail at turning the ship around. But he is an accomplished entrepreneur and just look at how much doubt and hate he gets while going through the process from scratch.

It's been like 3 and a half seconds since he took over, will you give him a minute!

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1590384919829962752

View: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1590384919829962752?s=20&t=HR-kAFXj8TA5WmqBb7aTJQ

Sounds like an action plan and advice that would come straight from any top book on business.

Thank you, exactly.

You don't get to become the type of person who can buy a $44 billion business outright by not knowing business.

 

[Fox]

Looks like most of the staff left/fired last night.



The next few days/weeks should be interesting.

If he can make it work (I think he can) then he will have reduced like 75% of the workforce and probably 1-2 billion in payroll expenses each year.

This is from back in October...


So going by those numbers 1/4 of the staff costs 800m a year.

So 3/4 gone should be 2.5 Billion a year cut.
Plus the costs that would go along with that.

It is crazy how bloated these businesses are.
Just a few weeks back there were some viral videos showing how lazy the attitude is.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1585395267552960512

^ Like 100000% odds these folks were getting fired once any kind of downturn came.

 

[MTF]

Looks like most of the staff left/fired last night.

View attachment 45977

The next few days/weeks should be interesting.

If he can make it work (I think he can) then he will have reduced like 75% of the workforce and probably 1-2 billion in payroll expenses each year.

This is from back in October...

View attachment 45976
So going by those numbers 1/4 of the staff costs 800m a year.

So 3/4 gone should be 2.5 Billion a year cut.
Plus the costs that would go along with that.

It is crazy how bloated these businesses are.
Just a few weeks back there were some viral videos showing how lazy the attitude is.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1585395267552960512

^ Like 100000% odds these folks were getting fired once any kind of downturn came.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-voQsFY6SE

 

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[Fox]

No idea to be honest, I don't own Fidelity or am I a part of it. I was merely reposting the article, stating they have marked down the value of their own equity stake in Twitter. No idea why they would lie, or creative account, however like MJ, I'm not an accountant so don't understand the finer points of these things. Thus I'm fully prepared to accept the article is wrong if proved so.

Wasn't directed at you - just how lame the mainstream media is these days.

I don't see any way it hasn't gone up in value:
- It is getting more users
- It for sure has more engagement
- It reduced its overhead costs by a lot (staff etc)
- It has become more influential / important
- It is working on better ads (they always sucked anyway)

To me the underlying asset of something like Twitter is "are people using it".
And Twitters user base is strong atm.