Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, has made an offer to buy Twitter for $41 billion (Sh4.79 trillion), just days after turning down a position on the social media company’s board of directors.
Musk’s offer price of $54.20 per share (Sh6257.39), revealed in a regulatory filing on Thursday, is a 38 percent premium to Twitter’s April 1 close, the final trading day before the Tesla CEO’s more than 9% holding in the company was made public.
In premarket trading, Twitter’s stock increased by 12%.
Here is what Musk wrote in a letter to Twitter Chairman Bret Taylor, as disclosed in a new SEC filing.
“I invested in Twitter as I believe in its potential to be the platform for free speech around the globe, and I believe free speech is a societal imperative for a functioning democracy.
However, since making my investment I now realize the company will neither thrive nor serve this societal imperative in its current form. Twitter needs to be transformed as a private company.
As a result, I am offering to buy 100% of Twitter for $54.20 per share in cash, a 54% premium over the day before I began investing in Twitter and a 38% premium over the day before my investment was publicly announced. My offer is my best and final offer and if it is not accepted, I would need to reconsider my position as a shareholder.
Twitter has extraordinary potential. I will unlock it.”
Elon Musk has been pushing to have changes on the platform if his tweets are anything to go by, but it seems it’s almost impossible to actualize them.