Musk’s £35bn Twitter deal put on hold

eLon Musk caused a sensation yesterday when he said his £35billion deal to buy Twitter was ‘temporarily on hold’.

The world’s richest man revealed the takeover was on ice over concerns about the number of spam accounts on the social media platform.

The shock move led to speculation that Mr Musk, pictured, is about to walk away from the takeover. Twitter’s share price dipped to around $40, against the offer price of $54.40, with investors betting that the deal is off.

Mr Musk, 50, chief executive of electric car maker Tesla, made the announcement in a tweet, saying he was waiting for information ‘supporting the calculation that spam accounts do indeed represent less than 5 per cent of users’.

his tweet referred to a filing on May 2 in which Twitter said its number of spam users represented ‘fewer than 5 per cent of our monetisable daily active users’.

The higher the number of spam accounts, the less money Twitter can make, because it is unable to target users and make money from them. Twitter also admitted in the filing that the actual number could be higher because of the way the company calculates spam accounts. It added: ‘We are continually seeking to improve our ability to estimate the total number of spam accounts.’

Mr Musk bought Twitter in a whirlwind, even waiving his right to carry out due diligence while negotiating terms.

But there has been growing concern among investors that the Tesla founder’s bid will not go through due to the significant financial and political exposure linked to the deal.

he faces a $1billion (£820million) termination fee if he pulls out of the takeover.