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On Monday, local time, Twitter announced that they had reached a final acquisition agreement with an entity wholly owned by elon Musk, the world's richest man.
The counterparty acquired Twitter for $54.20 per share for about $44 billion.
After the transaction closes, Twitter will become a company privately controlled by Musk.
Musk also confirmed the acquisition news on Twitter on the same day. He said Twitter will continue to provide a platform for people to express different opinions, and he also shared his vision for twitter's future .
He hopes to make Twitter's algorithm public to make transparent the specific logic of content recommendation and blocking, and increase people's trust. He also wants everyone to be certified in real name.
"Free speech is the cornerstone of democracy, and Twitter is a cyber square that should get people to discuss issues that are vital to the future of humanity." Twitter has tremendous potential, and I look forward to working with companies and user communities to unlock it." “
As soon as the news of the acquisition came out, everyone was confused: Musk actually bought Twitter? Not dreaming, right?
A few days ago, everyone was still looking at it as a joke, betting that Musk could not succeed in the acquisition. Unexpectedly, just 10 days after Musk made a $44 billion offer to buy Twitter, the acquisition was completed.
Sure enough, this is the speed at which the world's richest man emptied his shopping cart, 44 billion, say buy it!
Netizens have also quipped that they no longer have to worry about being deleted.
Some netizens even dug up Musk's post 5 years ago: it turned out that Musk wanted to buy Twitter 5 years ago....
Musk, who has more than 85 million followers on twitter, often tweets to express his views on many things, and sometimes his one sentence can trigger the butterfly effect.
For example, he previously tweeted in support of Dogecoin, which triggered the explosion of cryptocurrencies.
In February last year, one of his tweets ignited the voice social networking app Clubhouse, and the invitation code was once hyped to thousands of yuan.
However, it was because of Musk's remarks that also caused dissatisfaction among Twitter founder Jack Dorsey and the company's management, so they decided to censor the content he posted.
Musk, who is dissatisfied with his post being deleted and blocked, has also begun to fight back.
In March, he frequently launched a vote on Twitter restricting free speech.
In the "Freedom of Speech is essential to the proper functioning of democracy, do you think Twitter strictly adheres to this principle?" More than 2 million people voted on the issue, and more than 70 percent of them voted "no."
He then hinted at the possibility of developing a new "Twitter": "Need a new platform? ”
But apparently Musk did not choose to do it head-on, re-build a platform to compete with Twitter, in fact, he has quietly deployed a big plan behind his back.
There is a famous saying in the business world: "If you can't beat them, then buy them." ”
So Musk began to buy a small amount of Twitter shares every day at the end of January this year, and on March 14, he had accumulated more than 5% of Twitter's shares.
That number isn't low, as According to data for the third quarter of 2021, Morgan Stanley, Twitter's largest shareholder, accounts for only 9.2 percent of its outstanding shares.
On April 4, Musk claimed that he had quietly become Twitter's largest shareholder and owned a 9.2 percent stake in the company, worth about $2.9 billion.
At this moment, people realized that Musk, who had been calling twitter, had quietly penetrated into them.
After becoming a major shareholder, Musk really has a different voice, he released a poll, let users vote on whether they want Twitter to add an "edit" button,
Frightened Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal urged users to "vote with caution."
He also listed the head Twitter accounts, which he said were hardly active, asking, "Is Twitter going to die?" ”，
He even suggested that Twitter remove ads and turn their headquarters into a homeless shelter, ironically suggesting that no high-level executives went to work anyway.
On April 14, Musk offered to buy 100% of Twitter for $41.39 billion in cash, threatening it was the best offer.
Twitter, on the other hand, is smiling at Musk on the surface, but behind the scenes, he is racking his brains to find ways to stop him from further actions.
While welcoming major shareholder Musk to the board, they launched a defensive measure, "Poison Pill Plan", to make Musk's acquisition more difficult.
That includes having all other shareholders buy shares at discounted prices as a way to dilute Musk's shares and prevent him from accumulating more than 15 percent of Twitter's shares.
On April 21, Musk claimed he had $46.5 billion in money on hand, of which $21 billion came from his own equity financing, and that he had also received $22.5 billion in debt financing from Morgan Stanley and other financial institutions.
Unexpectedly, just a few days later, the attitude of Twitter's board of directors underwent a 180° change, and actually began to discuss the acquisition with Musk....
Netizen: The front is not willing to be acquired, it turned out that the money was not enough....
After Musk bought Twitter, Twitter users also exploded and divided into two camps. Some expressed support, while others decided to delete the number and leave Twitter.
For example, Henrik Fisker, the founder and CEO of the electric car company Fisker, first tweeted to let netizens pay attention to him on other platforms, and then deleted Twitter's account.
Someone's original number was unsealed.
Fox News host Tucker Carlson tweeted last month that dr. Rachel Levine, assistant health minister for transgender women, was banned on Twitter for violating the rules.
A few hours after the news of the acquisition was released, his number was unblocked. He immediately tweeted, "We're back!" ”
So netizens have speculated that former US President Trump, who was tragically suspended after the congressional riots on January 6, 2021, will return to Twitter?!
However, Sichuan fan is estimated to be disappointed. Because Trump said that even if the Twitter account is restored, he will not use Twitter, only the social platform Truth, which he developed.
In an interview with Fox News, he also played a pun: "I'm not going to Twitter, I'm going to stay on Trust." (I want to stand by the truth). ”（I am not going on Twitter, I am going to stay on Truth)
How Twitter, which was acquired by Musk, will develop next, we have no way of knowing.
It can only be said that the world's richest man, really rich and willful....
End
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