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Elon Musk just said he wants to buy 100% of Twitter

This has to be a shitpost, right?

Elon musk scrooge mcduck
Image: KnowTechie

UPDATE 4/25/2022 4:13 PM ET: Elon Musk is officially buying Twitter. Twitter “has entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by an entity wholly owned by Elon Musk.” The transaction is valued at nearly $44 billion. The original story follows below.

The drama surrounding Twitter and Elon Musk isn’t over, folks. The Technoking billionaire wants to take over the microblogging site, offering to buy 100-percent of outstanding stocks in a deal worth $43 billion.

That’s big news, and we only know about it because Musk filed corrected paperwork with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Thursday.

That filing changed Musk’s position of owning 9.1-percent of Twitter’s stock from a passive investor to an active investor, which we all thought was to do with Musk joining Twitter’s board of directors.

Twitter has extraordinary potential. I will unlock it,” said Elon Musk, in a letter to Twitter chairman Bret Taylor.

Three days ago, Musk shocked everyone by turning down his board seat. Now we know why; he was preparing paperwork for a hostile takeover bid to own the microblogging site entirely.

What’s Musk’s master plan for Twitter?

He wants to take the company private. His letter to Twitter’s chairman reiterates his position about Twitter serving the public trust best as an adherent to free speech principles.

READ MORE: Is Twitter better off private? Corporate scholars would disagree

If Twitter denies Musk’s takeover bid? Well, he’s said that he would “have to reconsider [his] position as a shareholder,” as he has “no confidence in [the] management.”

Reading between the lines here, does Elon Musk really want to own Twitter? Or is this all an elaborate, and expensive, shitpost of the type he’s known for?

It wouldn’t be beyond his sense of humor to buy so much stock, make a confusing kerfuffle to grab headlines, then make up a reason to sell once the stock has increased in value.

Twitter stock jumped 12-percent before trading this morning based on the news. The deal on the table values Twitter’s stock at $54.20 per share, in an all-cash move. That’s 54-percent higher than Twitter’s stock on January 28, “the day before Musk began buying into Twitter,” according to Insider.

But really, why does Elon Musk desperately want to buy Twitter? The Tesla CEO spoke at a TED Live conference hours after he made a formal offer to buy the company, and stated that he was doing it for the “future of civilization.”

“My strong intuitive sense is that having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization,” he said.

Musk goes on to explain other reasons why he thinks he should own Twitter, along with suggestions he believes could make the platform better. You can watch the full interview below:

So is Twitter taking the bait? At this time, it’s unclear, but the company’s CEO, Parag Agrawal, tells employees the board is still evaluating an Elon Musk takeover.

UPDATE 10/45/2022 8:20 AM ET: This article has been updated to include information from Elon Musk’s TED Live talk.

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Maker, meme-r, and unabashed geek with nearly half a decade of blogging experience. If it runs on electricity (or even if it doesn't), Joe probably has one around his office somewhere. His hobbies include photography, animation, and hoarding Reddit gold.

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