Elon Musk Offers To Buy Twitter For $43 Billion

SAN FRANCISCO — Billionaire Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, and the world's richest man, is offering to buy Twitter for more than $43 billion.

Twitter said in a regulatory filing Thursday that Musk, who recently became the company's largest shareholder, proposed buying the platform's remaining shares that he doesn't already own at $54.20 per share, according to The Associated Press.

Musk, who has criticized Twitter on its free speech principles, said the company needs to be transformed as a private company. He called the price his best and final offer, but provided no financing details. The offer is non-binding and subject to financing and other conditions.

"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," Musk said in the filing. "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."

Twitter said it received Musk's offer and will decide whether it is in the best interests of shareholders to accept or continue to operate as a publicly traded company.

Analyst Daniel Ives of Wedbush said in a client note that he believes "this soap opera will end with Musk owning Twitter after this aggressive hostile takeover of the company." He thinks it would be hard for any other bidders or consortium to come forward and said Twitter's board will likely be forced to accept Musk's offer or start a process to sell the company.

Musk has bought up shares in near-daily batches beginning in late January. He ended up with a 9 percent stake, with only Vanguard Group's suite of mutual funds and ETFs controlling more Twitter shares.

After Musk announced his stake, Twitter quickly offered him a board seat on the condition that he not own more than 14.9 percent of the company's outstanding stock, according to a filing. The company later said he declined the offer.

Musk didn't explain why, but following the decision, Musk sent a barrage of since-deleted tweets proposing major changes to the company, including dropping ads — its chief source of revenue — and transforming its San Francisco headquarters into a homeless shelter.

But Musk left clues on Twitter about his intentions. He "liked" a tweet summarizing the events as Musk going from "largest shareholder for Free Speech" to being "told to play nice and not speak freely."

On Tuesday, a lawsuit accused Musk of unlawfully delaying disclosure of his stake in the social media company so he could buy more shares at lower prices.

The complaint in New York federal court accused Musk of violating a regulatory deadline to reveal he had accumulated a stake of at least 5 percent. Instead, the complaint alleged that Musk didn't disclose his position in Twitter until he'd nearly doubled his stake to more than 9 percent.

The strategy, the lawsuit said, harmed investors who sold shares in the San Francisco company in the roughly two weeks before Musk acknowledged holding a major stake.

Regulatory filings showed that he bought about 620,000 shares at $36.83 apiece Jan. 31. He continued accumulating more shares through April 1.

The Associated Press contributed reporting.