4 ms·

Musk wasn't pretending to buy Twitter, the article is using a sort of simpleton interpretation of Musk's behavior. That's the interpretation someone would take

Musk wasn't pretending to buy Twitter, the article is using a sort of simpleton interpretation of Musk's behavior. That's the interpretation someone would take if they dislike Musk and get overly emotional about his behavior. Musk is x y z. Oh my god, did you see the tweet he sent out!?! I just hate Musk, blah blah blah. He's such a terrible human. This one time he called a person a really bad name. - That's the type of person that reads Musk's Twitter acquisition attempt the way the article is. I don't care much about Musk one way or another, but this is not a complicated context and the author is plain wrong. What happened is the market for hyper overvalued stocks has crashed. He was faced with the scenario of paying double for Twitter vs what it was really worth. Remove the Musk prop and the stock collapses. Next up, the stock is heading south of $30 / share. It might be worth taking over for $20-$25 / share at most. Musk didn't want to pay $20 billion more for Twitter than he had to, even for him that was a bridge too far. Particularly while his own paper bubble fortune is just as at risk of implosion as the rest. It was really, really, really dumb timing. That was Musk's actual issue.

kcplate 4y ago
This to me seems the most reasonable explanation and explains most of the behaviors involved on both sides. I don’t buy into “it was just a joke that went too far” theory. Musk doesn’t want a turd. Twitter, essentially made a deal with the devil (from their perspective). Despite being initially opposed to this deal, they now has to sue to try and make it happen, because I suspect if it doesn’t “south of $30” is going to be more like “around $20” and there are a whole bunch of folks that might get interested in a takeover at that level with far more villain potential than Musk.
- dodobirdlord 4y ago
  The possibility of other takeovers doesn’t need to factor into this. If Twitter’s share price is significantly below the price they can force Musk to buy the company at, then the board has an obligation to shareholders to force the sale, and will be sued by the shareholders if they don’t.
  - kcplate 4y ago
    It’s going to be interesting to see if Musk can prove they are holding back data. I think Twitter does have a danger here. Their <5% bots was always an estimate. You can know, not know, or not want to know. That last part is the danger.
    - dodobirdlord 4y ago
      If they’re actually holding back data they contractually agreed to provide, then they aren’t living up to their side of the contract and maybe he has a way out. That doesn’t seem to be the case though. There is no “provided Elon Musk can verify that bots are less than 5% of users” clause in the contract.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    Spot on.
- raziel2701 4y ago
  Musk decided to pay $54.20/share (because weed joke) for twitter under the guise that he was going to fix the bot problem. Now he wants to back out of the deal because of the bot problem. He makes no sense.
  - kcplate 4y ago
    He wants to back out because the size of his wallet has gotten smaller because of the market, twitter’s value is significantly less than when the offer was made, and apparently Twitter is holding back on providing some data. If he proves that last part, Twitter is screwed because there is no doubt it’s going to underscore the bot problem even further and I think their stock is going to dip into the low 20s.
  - mlindner 4y ago
    His reason for buying it was never the bot problem. Where are people inventing this reasoning from. His reason for buying it was to create a public square, which he stated multiple times. He hardly mentioned the bots at all before setting out to buy Twitter.
vehementi 4y ago
I guess you didn't read the article because Levine explains that scenario in this and previous articles lol?

kcplate 4y ago

This to me seems the most reasonable explanation and explains most of the behaviors involved on both sides. I don’t buy into “it was just a joke that went too far” theory. Musk doesn’t want a turd. Twitter, essentially made a deal with the devil (from their perspective). Despite being initially opposed to this deal, they now has to sue to try and make it happen, because I suspect if it doesn’t “south of $30” is going to be more like “around $20” and there are a whole bunch of folks that might get interested in a takeover at that level with far more villain potential than Musk.

dodobirdlord 4y ago
The possibility of other takeovers doesn’t need to factor into this. If Twitter’s share price is significantly below the price they can force Musk to buy the company at, then the board has an obligation to shareholders to force the sale, and will be sued by the shareholders if they don’t.
- kcplate 4y ago
  It’s going to be interesting to see if Musk can prove they are holding back data. I think Twitter does have a danger here. Their <5% bots was always an estimate. You can know, not know, or not want to know. That last part is the danger.
  - dodobirdlord 4y ago
    If they’re actually holding back data they contractually agreed to provide, then they aren’t living up to their side of the contract and maybe he has a way out. That doesn’t seem to be the case though. There is no “provided Elon Musk can verify that bots are less than 5% of users” clause in the contract.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  Spot on.
raziel2701 4y ago
Musk decided to pay $54.20/share (because weed joke) for twitter under the guise that he was going to fix the bot problem. Now he wants to back out of the deal because of the bot problem. He makes no sense.
- kcplate 4y ago
  He wants to back out because the size of his wallet has gotten smaller because of the market, twitter’s value is significantly less than when the offer was made, and apparently Twitter is holding back on providing some data. If he proves that last part, Twitter is screwed because there is no doubt it’s going to underscore the bot problem even further and I think their stock is going to dip into the low 20s.
- mlindner 4y ago
  His reason for buying it was never the bot problem. Where are people inventing this reasoning from. His reason for buying it was to create a public square, which he stated multiple times. He hardly mentioned the bots at all before setting out to buy Twitter.

vehementi 4y ago

I guess you didn't read the article because Levine explains that scenario in this and previous articles lol?