Elon Musk no longer wants to buy Twitter because of allegedly false information. Explosive text messages with his banker point in a different direction.
Delaware – There has been an unexpected development in the legal dispute over the acquisition of Twitter by billionaire US entrepreneur Elon Musk. The legal team of the social media group wants to convince the responsible court in Delaware (USA) that Musk did not let the deal burst because of a large number of fake accounts on the platform – but because he was allegedly afraid of World War III.
According to a report by the Bloomberg news agency, Bill Savitt, a lawyer for Twitter, on Tuesday (September 6th, 2022) produced a risqué text message between Elon Musk and one of his bankers as evidence. In the May 8 message, the Tesla and SpaceX founder urged the banker to slow down the acquisition process while awaiting Russian President Vladimir Putin’s speech defending his decision to go to war with Ukraine.
Elon Musk: Concerned about Putin and the world war
On May 9, not only Musk, but the whole world was looking forward to Moscow. Politicians and the media were anticipating a martial war speech by the Kremlin ruler – peppered with nuclear threats against the international community and the announcement of a general mobilization in Russia in order to gain the upper hand in the miserable campaign against Ukraine. However, the fears did not come true. Vladimir Putin was more reserved in his address to the nation, seemed almost sheepish.
The day before, Elon Musk is said to have worried that the situation could escalate beyond the borders of Ukraine and Russia. “It doesn’t make sense to buy Twitter when we’re headed for World War III,” the now 51-year-old wrote, according to lawyers, who are quoted by Bloomberg . With the text messages, Twitter is trying to refute the arguments of the entrepreneur, who had stated that he no longer wanted to buy the platform because the group had given false information about dummy accounts.
Elon Musk’s Twitter bid was set very high
It had previously become known that Musk had also brought up allegations from a whistleblower in order to withdraw from the deal. In a letter to Twitter, the electric car pioneer’s legal team said that the takeover bid was no longer valid due to allegations that Twitter had “egregious” deficiencies in the security and protection of user data.
Musk has been trying since mid-May to address Twitter’s allegedly false estimates of the number of spam and fake accounts. That’s why he stopped the takeover process, he said again and again. Critics of the billionaire believe that Musk used this tactic to drive down the price. His bid was $44 billion ($54.20 per share), Twitter’s market value is currently only around $31.5 billion – well below that. However, Twitter is demanding that Musk make his offer come true and take over the company for 44 billion. (tvd)
