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He doesn't "need" Twitter to ever be worth anywhere near what he paid. As long as he can make the debt service payments, he can die with Twitter still in the re

He doesn't "need" Twitter to ever be worth anywhere near what he paid. As long as he can make the debt service payments, he can die with Twitter still in the red and he'll die with more in the bank and a higher quality of life than you, me, and Taleb. All the usual business calculus kind of goes out the window when you have a single owner that only needs to stay afloat and may not care about maximizing profit or value.

LordDragonfang 4y ago
Of course, the counterargument is that all of Elon's moves so far have been exactly consistent with a new owner who only cares about profit. Cutting staff, implementing draconian crunch time, telling advertisers things that are what they want to hear but the opposite of what you're telling the public, adding fees where they weren't there before, raising prices and cutting features...
watwut 4y ago
He has to maximize profit. Otherwise he won't be able to pay that debt. It is not like he has a choice there, he took on huge debt and even maximized profit might not be enough.
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  I think you are missing the point. If he wants to, he could simply off the debt, or run at a ~1 billion loss for the rest of his life. That said, it is likely that he want to make a profit, at least on an annual basis, if not overall ROI
  - watwut 4y ago
    > If he wants to, he could simply off the debt, or run at a ~1 billion loss for the rest of his life. Can he actually off the debt without endangering his other businesses? Do you really think 1 billion yearly loss is something he can be comfortable with? His worth is in propery and businesses mostly, he does not have it sitting in a bank. That is the thing. He needs to maximize profits in order to ... not be in huge loss. Like, yeah, this is political project of his and it is both celebrated (by political side that gains by him owning it) and yelled about (by political side that is about to be pushed away from there) for political reasons. But, that does not mean he can have it as complete looser - if nothing for ego reasons. And his initial moves are moves of someone desperate to save some cash and panicking.
    - s1artibartfast 4y ago
      >Can he actually off the debt without endangering his other businesses? Do you really think 1 billion yearly loss is something he can be comfortable with? His worth is in propery and businesses mostly, he does not have it sitting in a bank. That is the thing. He needs to maximize profits in order to ... not be in huge loss. Yeah, I think he could realistically run twitter as a non-profit if we wanted, and eat the cost until he died. He owns half of SpaceX worth ~125 billion, and could sell $1 billion per year indefinitely without losing control. The reality is that he obviously doesn't want to have twitter as money sink (reference intended). He is no stranger to losing vast amounts of money in the short term, so I personally don't think panic is driving his behavior. Rather, I think this is simply what a hostile Elon takeover looks like and how he operates. That is to say, like a bull in a china shop with full media coverage. There will be flailing, bold claims, pivots, mystery, and intrigue. Underneath that, the real work will be a radical restructuring and gutting of the existing corporate culture.

LordDragonfang 4y ago

Of course, the counterargument is that all of Elon's moves so far have been exactly consistent with a new owner who only cares about profit. Cutting staff, implementing draconian crunch time, telling advertisers things that are what they want to hear but the opposite of what you're telling the public, adding fees where they weren't there before, raising prices and cutting features...

watwut 4y ago

He has to maximize profit. Otherwise he won't be able to pay that debt. It is not like he has a choice there, he took on huge debt and even maximized profit might not be enough.

s1artibartfast 4y ago
I think you are missing the point. If he wants to, he could simply off the debt, or run at a ~1 billion loss for the rest of his life. That said, it is likely that he want to make a profit, at least on an annual basis, if not overall ROI
- watwut 4y ago
  > If he wants to, he could simply off the debt, or run at a ~1 billion loss for the rest of his life. Can he actually off the debt without endangering his other businesses? Do you really think 1 billion yearly loss is something he can be comfortable with? His worth is in propery and businesses mostly, he does not have it sitting in a bank. That is the thing. He needs to maximize profits in order to ... not be in huge loss. Like, yeah, this is political project of his and it is both celebrated (by political side that gains by him owning it) and yelled about (by political side that is about to be pushed away from there) for political reasons. But, that does not mean he can have it as complete looser - if nothing for ego reasons. And his initial moves are moves of someone desperate to save some cash and panicking.
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    >Can he actually off the debt without endangering his other businesses? Do you really think 1 billion yearly loss is something he can be comfortable with? His worth is in propery and businesses mostly, he does not have it sitting in a bank. That is the thing. He needs to maximize profits in order to ... not be in huge loss. Yeah, I think he could realistically run twitter as a non-profit if we wanted, and eat the cost until he died. He owns half of SpaceX worth ~125 billion, and could sell $1 billion per year indefinitely without losing control. The reality is that he obviously doesn't want to have twitter as money sink (reference intended). He is no stranger to losing vast amounts of money in the short term, so I personally don't think panic is driving his behavior. Rather, I think this is simply what a hostile Elon takeover looks like and how he operates. That is to say, like a bull in a china shop with full media coverage. There will be flailing, bold claims, pivots, mystery, and intrigue. Underneath that, the real work will be a radical restructuring and gutting of the existing corporate culture.