Elon Musk wants to buy Twitter for 43 billion dollars

Not settling for 10%, Elon Musk wants it all, and has made a tasty offer to buy 100% of Twitter.

That’s right, Elon Musk has made an offer to buy Twitter in an SEC filing, where he is offering to pay $54.20 per share in cash, totaling $43.4 billion.

That’s more than the stock was worth before he bought 10%.

In his words:

“I invested in Twitter because I believe in its potential to be the platform for free speech around the world, and I believe that free speech is a social imperative for a functioning democracy.”

Elon Musk emailed Twitter CEO Bret Taylor with this offer, where he adds:

“Since making my investment I understood that the company will not grow or fulfill its social imperative (free speech) in its current form. Twitter needs to be transformed into a private company. Twitter has extraordinary potential. I’m going to unlock it.

What you are offering is an amount at a 54% premium over the day before you started investing in Twitter, and a 38% premium over the day before you publicly announced your investment. He indicates that this is his best and final offer, and in the event that it is not accepted, he will have to reconsider his position as a shareholder.

Twitter stock is now worth $50.97 per share, up 11.97% from yesterday’s closing price.

Twitter is the black sheep of the Silicon Valley tech sector but one that nevertheless remains at the center of conversations when it does something important. A few years ago it was rumored that they would buy Twitter for figures ranging from $27 billion to $16 billion, now we are looking at a much higher number.

The funding rounds and its stock market activity have brought substantial profits to Twitter, but it has been its facet as an advertising portal that has kept the company alive, now may be the big time to change course and grow more as a private company.

It is clear that Elon Musk wants to do things his way, and at 10% his voice is not loud enough. He wants to own free speech on Twitter.

Adds Elon Musk:

“My offer is the best and it is the final one; and if it is not accepted I will have to reconsider my position as a shareholder.”

Elon Musk tells us what he wants to change at Twitter

The news of the week was Elon Musk’s offer to buy Twitter, transforming it into a private company. If this happens (they are still analyzing the offer), Elon Musk will be able to do whatever he wants with the social network, and he has already explained what he intends.

His priority would be to eliminate spam and spam bots, the armies of bots that are on Twitter getting in between human conversations.

He said this during a TED event in Vancouver, where he also indicated that he would improve the Twitter user experience, open up the algorithm code and make the social network a more transparent platform.

He also talks about editing tweets:

“If there are any changes to people’s tweets, if they are emphasized or de-emphasized, that action should be made obvious, there should be no behind-the-scenes manipulation of any kind, whether algorithmic or manual.”

Elon Musk believes in betting more on content moderation policy changes, and when in doubt do nothing when we come across a tweet of concern.

“In a case where maybe there’s a lot of controversy, you might not want to promote that tweet. I’m not saying I have all the answers here. I think we want to be very reluctant to delete things and be very wary of permanent bans. Timeouts are better.”

Another issue he commented on is that he doesn’t intend to turn Twitter into a money-making machine, and does intend to turn it into a benchmark for free communication.

The board is prepared to put roadblocks in the way of Musk’s takeover bid, and that includes allowing shareholders to buy more shares at a deep discount to lessen the chances of a hostile takeover.

We don’t yet know what Musk will do if his offer is rejected, but something tells me they will accept it.