Elon Musk acquires Twitter for $44 billion
The news is confirmed: Elon Musk has agreed to buy Twitter Inc. in a deal valued at about $44 billion, moving the world’s richest man a step closer to taking control of the social-media platform.
Twitter shareholders will receive $54.20 per share in cash, a 38% premium to Twitter’s closing stock price on April 1, the last trading day before Mr. Musk disclosed his roughly 9% stake in the company.
Shares of Twitter, which were halted when the deal was announced, rose 5.9% to $51.80 after news of the agreement.
In the news release announcing the deal, Mr. Musk reiterated his push to soften Twitter’s stance on content moderation. “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” he said.
He also promised other new features, such as “making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots and authenticating all humans.”