Twitter deal is temporarily on hold on the amount of spam and fake accounts on the platform, Elon Musk divulged on Friday. The latest development just over a fortnight after Musk announced to acquire the microblogging platform for $44 billion (roughly Rs. 3,40,800 crore) last month. Musk claimed he would make Twitter algorithms open source and improve its policies to better support free speech on the platform — as a result of his acquisition. Shortly after Musk's move became official, reports suggested that the billionaire might reprice the deal.
- "Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/ fake accounts do indeed represent less than five percent of users," Musk tweeted on Friday.
- Twitter has not yet publicly commented on the matter. Elon Musk has also not provided any further details about whether he is particularly concerned with the given percentage of spam and fake users provided by Twitter.
- Earlier this month, Twitter said in a filing that fake and spam accounts comprise less than five percent of the total users on its platform.
- Elon Musk confirmed to buy Twitter for the $44 billion deal in April. On completion of the transaction, the San Francisco, California-based company will become a privately held company.
- According to the terms of the agreement, Twitter shareholders were set to receive $54.20 in cash for each share they hold upon closing the proposed transaction, the company said in its public statement announcing the deal last month.
- Musk was said to have secured over $7 billion (roughly Rs. 54,200 crore) in funding from a group of investors including Oracle Co-Founder Larry Ellison to fund his $44 billion deal.
- Investors recently suggested that Musk might not purchase Twitter for the agreed price of $44 billion as the company's shares plunged to their lowest level since the deal became public on April 25.
- Before the acquisition deal, Musk disclosed to have a 9.2 percent stake in Twitter in a regulatory filing.
- Musk recently stated that he would reverse Twitter's ban on former US President Donald Trump when he completes the acquisition. He called the decision "morally wrong and flat-out stupid" while speaking at the Financial Times Future of the Car conference. Musk also received support of US Republicans — the group of the political party that belongs Trump — for the acquisition move, though Democrats were not pleased with the deal.
- Elon Musk's buyout of Twitter also recently faced an antitrust review by the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Open Markets Institute recently demanded to stop the deal as it believed it could give the world's richest man "direct control over one of the world's most important platforms for public communications and debate."
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