Elon Musk sows doubt over Twitter takeover

Elon Musk sowed new chaos into the market over his takeover bid for Twitter Inc. on Friday, first claiming his offer was “temporarily on hold” and then maintaining he is “still committed” to the deal, sending the social media giant into a tailspin.

The billionaire initially sent an early tweet saying the $44 billion deal is pending until he receives more information about the proportion of fake accounts on the social media site, which sent Twitter stock tumbling as much as 25% in premarket trading. A few hours later he sent another tweet saying he is “still committed” to the deal. Twitter’s shares recouped some of their losses and were down 11% at 9:45 a.m. in New York.

Musk said he was waiting for details on a recent filing from Twitter that fake accounts on the social media platform contributed less than 5% of its users. Twitter said in its latest quarterly results “that the average of false or spam accounts during the first quarter of 2022 represented fewer than 5% of our monthly daily active users during the quarter.” However, this datapoint has been part of Twitter’s quarterly filings for almost a decade. Twitter said it applied “significant judgment” to its latest estimate, and the true number could be higher.