Elon Musk’s $44 billion deal to acquire Twitter “cannot move forward” without “proof” for a fake accounts estimate previously disclosed by the social media giant, the Tesla and SpaceX boss tweeted on Tuesday.
On May 13, he had said the mega-transaction was “temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users.” That comment came after a Twitter regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), in which the firm estimated how many of its “monetizable daily active users” were false or spam accounts. Twitter reported 229 million users who were served advertising in the first quarter, with 5 percent of those amounting to 11.45 million.
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“Yesterday, Twitter’s CEO publicly refused to show proof of <5%,” Musk tweeted early on Tuesday. “This deal cannot move forward until he does.” He also said in his Twitter comment: “20% fake/spam accounts, while 4 times what Twitter claims, could be *much* higher.”
And Musk emphasized that his offer for the social giant “was based on Twitter’s SEC filings being accurate.”
Twitter responded, in part, by filing a preliminary proxy statement Tuesday, in which the company stood by the deal.
“Twitter is committed to completing the transaction on the agreed price and terms as promptly as practicable,” the company wrote in a press release connected to the filing.
Last month, Musk unveiled a $44 billion deal to take over Twitter and vowed to end its content moderation. Last week, he disclosed that he had received letters from investors committing nearly $7.14 billion in new financing for his Twitter deal and was also in talks to bring co-founder Jack Dorsey and others on board as investors.
According to the proxy statement filed Tuesday, Dorsey played a large role in Musk’s decision to buy Twitter. While fielding an offer to join Twitter’s board of directors — due to Musk’s newly disclosed 9 percent stake in the company — Musk asked Dorsey for his thoughts on the company.
“As part of this discussion, Mr. Dorsey shared his personal view that Twitter would be better able to focus on execution as a private company,” the filing reads.
Musk met with Dorsey on April 5. On April 9, before Musk’s appointment to the board became effective, Musk turned down the board seat and instead said he would make an offer to take Twitter private.
