Elon Musk once again threatens to withdraw his offer to buy from Twitter

Elon Musk he threatened on Monday to withdraw his offering of 44,000 million dollars to acquire Twitteraccusing the company of refuse to provide information about their fake user accounts.

Attorneys for the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX threatened in a letter to Twitter dated Monday. The platform included the letter in a request to the United States Securities and Exchange Commission.

The letter states this Musk has requested information multiple times since May 9about a month after he made his offer to buy the company, claiming it would allow him to evaluate how many of the company’s 229 million accounts are actually owned by fake users.

The CEO of Twitter Parag Agrawal claimed that Twitter has consistently estimated that less than 5% of its accounts are fake, but Musk disproved that, stating in a tweet posted in May that 20% or more of the accounts are fake.

Shares of Twitter Inc. fell more than 3% in early trading on Monday, likely to outrage Twitter shareholders who sued Musk late last month for deflate the price of those documents. Shares of Twitter have fallen 23% in the past month.

In a statement Monday, Twitter said it “has and will continue to cooperatively share information with Musk to complete the transaction, consistent with the terms of the merger agreement.”

“We intend to close the transaction and execute the merger agreement at the agreed price and terms,” ​​he added.

Elon Musk’s comings and goings with Twitter

Musk agreed in April to buy Twitter for $ 54.20 per share. Since then, Musk has taken several steps, including a public dispute on the social network itself with Twitter CEO over fake accounts, which has led some pundits to wonder if the billionaire wants to close the deal, or at least. reduce your bid for the company.

The businessman’s lawyers said in the letter that Twitter only offered to provide details on the company’s testing methods to determine the number of accounts, but said that this “amounts to denying Mr. Musk “and constitutes a “material breach” of the merger agreement and gives Musk the right to cancel the deal if he so wishes.

“This is a clear material breach of Twitter’s obligations under the merger agreement and Mr. Musk reserves all resulting rights, including his right not to complete the transaction and his right to terminate the agreement. of merger “, reads the letter.

Musk wants the underlying data so he can do his own verification of what he says the lax methodologies of Twitter.

Twitter’s sales agreement allows Musk to withdraw from the agreement if there is a “material adverse effect” caused by the company. This is defined as a change that negatively affects Twitter’s economic or financial condition, Twitter has always said it is moving forward with the deal, even if it has not scheduled a shareholder vote on it.

Last month, Musk said it had unilaterally suspended the agreement, which experts said it couldn’t do. If he unilaterally cancels the agreement, he may be forced to pay a $ 1 billion fine for violation.

Musk’s latest move shows how he’s “looking for a way out of the deal or something he can use to get a price renegotiation,” he said. Brian Quinn, Professor of Law at Boston College. Quinn added that the matter is unlikely to go to court, as he himself has already given up his ability to request further due diligence.

“I doubt he’ll be allowed out,” Quinn said. “At some point, the Twitter board will get tired of this and will sue,” asking a judge to force Musk to honor the deal.

With information from AP.

SL