In an interview with Bloomberg at the Qatar Economic Forum on Tuesday, Elon Musk said that the biggest reason he put the deal on hold last month was the number of bots, or fake accounts, on Twitter. Musk suspects that the number is far higher than what the Twitter board officially admits, while Twitter claims that its data about fake accounts is accurate. Following a lot of back and forth over the issue, the Twitter board agreed to hand over the company’s internal data to Musk to help him calculate the number of fake users on the platform. However, despite having all the data at his disposal, Musk says “we’re still awaiting resolution” on the subject of spam accounts, suggesting his calculations are still a work in progress.
Roadblocks To Musk’s Twitter Acquisition
According to Musk, the second major issue that could thwart the acquisition is the portion of debt that is required to finance the deal. Musk had earlier said that he would pay $33.5 billion in cash and has raised $7.1 billion from investors, such as Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison and the crypto exchange Binance. However, the rest of the money has to come from bank loans, meaning the acquisition could be jeopardized if he cannot secure the financing.
Musk’s ‘Super Bad Feeling’ Could Result In Huge Job Losses At Tesla
The final part of the puzzle is a quick and unconditional approval from Twitter’s shareholders. In what must be music to Elon Musk’s ears, the Associated Press is reporting that Twitter’s board has unanimously recommended that the company’s shareholders approve the deal when the matter is put to the vote in late July or early August. While that doesn’t guarantee a ‘Yes’ vote, it is a positive step that the powers that be at the company have wholeheartedly embraced the idea of a Musk takeover. It was quite a change from just a few weeks ago when the company adopted a poison pill strategy to thwart the world’s richest man from acquiring Twitter.
