Conflict With Twitter Escalates As Elon Musk Countersues The Company

08/03/2022

2 minutes read

2022.08.03 13:49

Tesla CEO and prominent crypto influencer Elon Musk is countersuing Twitter (NYSE:TWTR) after the social media platform initially sued Musk for reneging on the acquisition agreement. The main points under which Musk’s countersuit was filed have not yet been made public.

Musk’s Fight Against Twitter

The dispute between the Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) CEO and micro-blogging platform heated up on Friday when Elon Musk countersued Twitter over the collapse of the acquisition deal.

On April 25th, 2022, Twitter and Musk himself announced that they had agreed on a deal for the social networking company worth approximately $44 billion. However, the centi-billionaire later walked away from the deal in July.

Musk publicly accused Twitter of not providing him with the relevant business information requested by him regarding spam and bot accounts.

Musk had previously claimed that he wanted to assess Twitter’s claims that only 5% of its monetizable daily active users were spam accounts.

In response, Twitter filed a lawsuit against Musk with the intention of forcing him to carry out the deal after Musk publicly stated his intentions to terminate the agreement in July.

Musk’s legal team also filed a confidential countersuit on Friday, July 29th, in a Delaware court. It is believed that the details of the lawsuit could be made accessible to the public shortly.

Chancellor Kathaleen St. J. McCormick (NYSE:MKC), the judge overseeing the case, issued an order on Thursday night that established a timeline, and ordered the five-day trial to begin on October 17th.

Crypto Related Plans for Twitter

When Musk was still considering the purchase of Twitter, he stressed that his goal was to eliminate cryptocurrency-related scams on the social network.

The Tesla CEO had previously proposed adding an optional payments-based authentication system that would allow individuals to prove their identity.

Musk confirmed that cryptocurrency payments are just one feature that Twitter could implement as a way to “maximize the usefulness of the service.”

Musk underlined that, in his view, integrating crypto payments into Twitter would make the process of sending and receiving money easier for all.

On the Flipside

The decisions made by Musk around the deal and ensuing case have left analysts questioning his true motives over his fake account allegations.
Everything seems to indicate that Musk is very attentive to the price of Twitter shares, an element that could also serve as an argument towards finalizing the agreement.

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