To which, Elon Musk responded with a poo emoji and then later repeated his claim that the company was miscalculating the figures.

According to industry experts, Musk might be looking for ways to renegotiate the price of the deal or instead walk away from it.

These rumours were fuelled even more on May 16 after Bloomberg reported that Musk had said in a tech conference that going with the deal at a lower price was simply ‘not out of the question.’

He further stated that there are spam accounts four times as compared to what Twitter claims. Defending this statement, Parag Agrawal said that he will have a discussion on this issue by collecting data, facts, and context.

Parag Agrawal even added that the company had used a combination of public and private data to decide which all accounts were real and even went through random samples every month. Twitter has also suspended over 500,000 suspected accounts on a daily basis and blocked millions.

Agrawal also stated that the margins of error are well within its estimate of spam accounts representing less than 5% of daily users.

He even said that he further shares this information with Elon Musk.

After Parag’s fair share of tweets, Twitter’s share fell below $38 and slid even more on Monday.

The post Parag Agrawal hits back as Musk casts doubts over fake Twitter accounts appeared first on International Finance.

However, moments after, Musk replied to his own tweet, saying still committed to acquisition.

After Musk’s announcement about the Twitter acquisition being put on hold, the stock of the microblogging platform dropped 11% pre-market, while Tesla scrip gained as much as 4.9%.

According to a Reuters report on May 2, Twitter estimated in a filing that false or spam accounts represented fewer than 5% of its monetizable daily active users during the first quarter.

Reuters also reported that the shares of the social media business plummeted 20% in premarket trade after the announcement.

In an earlier filing, Twitter stated that it faces many risks until the Musk agreement is finalized, including whether advertisers will continue to spend money on Twitter. In the first quarter, the advertising was served to 229 million users on Twitter.

Musk, the world’s richest man, has recently stated in a series of tweets that removing spambots off the platform is one of his top objectives.

Recently, the billionaire stated that if his purchase of Twitter goes through, Twitter’s ban on former President Donald Trump will be lifted, indicating how open the network could become to free expression under his control.

The post Elon Musk puts $44 billion Twitter takeover on hold appeared first on International Finance.

Here is the list of billionaires who now control vast swathes of the media landscape:

Elon Musk:

Last week, the world’s richest person agreed to pay $44 billion for Twitter, promising to unleash its amazing potential to advance free expression and democracy around the world.

Jeff Bezos:

In 2013, the Amazon founder and the world’s second-richest person paid $250 million for the Washington Post. The Washington Post was losing money when Bezos took it, and he described the business model as upside down.

Mark Zuckerberg:

Zuckerberg’s social empire extends beyond Facebook. He bought Instagram in 2012 worth $1 billion and WhatsApp in 2014 for $16 billion. Facebook changed its name to Meta late last year to reflect Zuckerberg’s goal to dominate the metaverse, which he describes as the next frontier.

The Barclay Brothers:

Billionaire twins David and Frederick Barclay purchased the Telegraph brands and the Spectator magazine in 2004. The European, The Scotsman, and the Sunday Business were originally owned by the brothers.

Lord Rothermere:

Jonathan Harmsworth, a great-grandson of one of the Mail’s co-founders, paid £1.6 billion to take the paper’s owner, The Daily Mail and General Trust (DGMT), private after 90 years as a public corporation.

The post Billionaires who have bought up the media appeared first on International Finance.

His bold and now apparently decisive takeover bid had come on April 14 when he tweeted his $54.20 for a share deal as a “take or leave” offer.

After the deal was through, he shared a statement on the platform on April 26, in which, he said, “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.”

“Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and users to unlock it,” he added.

While the board including the current CEO Parag Agrawal may have not been thrilled with this development, they eventually had to bow down to the pressure of the shareholders. They had also opposed the takeover bid by taking a “poison pill” which would have made it harder for Musk to go ahead with his dream of owning the 217 million strong platform of users across the world.

In a release, Twitter said that the transaction, which has been unanimously approved by the Twitter Board of Directors, is expected to close in 2022, subject to the approval of Twitter stockholders, the receipt of applicable regulatory approvals, and the satisfaction of other customary closing conditions.

Bret Taylor, Twitter’s Independent Board Chair, said, “The Twitter Board conducted a thoughtful and comprehensive process to assess Elon’s proposal with a deliberate focus on value, certainty, and financing. The proposed transaction will deliver a substantial cash premium, and we believe it is the best path forward for Twitter’s stockholders.”

The post Elon Musk to control Twitter along with SpaceX, Tesla appeared first on International Finance.