Elon Musk purchases 9.2% stake in Twitter after free speech poll

Elon Musk, according to a United States’ Security and Exchange Commission filing, has bought 73,486,938 unit shares of Twitter common stock, which is 9.2% of the total common stock in issuance. This puts the value of the purchase, using the filing date, the 14th of March 2022, at $2.74 billion.

This purchase announcement comes after Musk, the world’s richest billionaire and Dogecoin enthusiast, conducted a Twitter poll towards the end of March 2022. Musk took to Twitter on the 24th of March, to run a poll, asking whether or not Twitter algorithm should be open source.

He then did another poll the following day, asking whether or not Twitter rigorously adheres to the principle of free speech as essential to a functioning democracy. He then commented on his free speech poll stating, “The consequences of this poll will be important. Please vote carefully.”

What you should know

• After more than 70% said no, acknowledging that Twitter does not follow the principles of free speech, he asked whether a new platform was needed and said he was giving serious thought to starting his own.
• Musk is the CEO of the electric car company, Tesla. He is also a big fan of the cryptocurrency space, particularly Bitcoin and Dogecoin and is known for using his Twitter account to publicly announce his views on crypto.
• His tweets have sent prices of DOGE and even BTC skyrocketing. In February last year, Tesla announced its purchase of $1.5 billion in BTC and the price skyrocketed 19.5% from $38,850 to $46,400 within the day. Even on the day he announced that his company will stop Bitcoin as a means of payment, due to environmental concerns, the price of BTC declined on that day.
• In March 2022, prices of DOGE jumped 10% after Musk said in a tweet that he is not selling his crypto holdings, which includes DOGE.
• Musk has been one of the biggest personalities on Twitter and has regularly run into trouble on the platform. He is currently seeking to exit a 2018 deal with the SEC that put controls in place related to his tweeting about his company.
• The announcement will be yet another major test for new Twitter CEO, Parag Agrawal, who replaced Jack Dorsey after he unexpectedly resigned in November. Agrawal vowed to increase accountability, make decisions faster and to improve product execution. The company set ambitious goals for growth including increasing annual revenue to $7.5 billion and getting to 315 million daily users by the end of 2023.

Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in a research note that, “It looks like Elon has his eyes laser set on Twitter,” adding that the stake could lead to a “more aggressive ownership role.” Twitter shares surged about 19.56% in pre-market skirmish after Musk’s purchase was revealed.