The jury in the San Francisco national court ruled on Friday that Elon Musk deliberately misled Twitter investors, attempting to buy a platform for a lower price, informed Bloomberg and Reuter agencies. Billionaire lawyers have announced an appeal.
According to the jury, Musk deliberately misled Twitter shareholders by publishing entries in which he claimed that the platform had besides many false accounts and bots, which would lead to a decline in its value. The suit concerns investors who claim to have sold Twitter shares at prices artificially undercut by Musk between 13 May and 4 October 2022, following Musk's statements.
Musk agreed to acquisition Twitter in April 2022. Shortly thereafter, he published entries that the jury found confusing with investors. In 1 of them, he stated that the acquisition of the platform was "provisionally halted" until it was confirmed that bots account for little than 5% of users. In the second, he wrote that the percent of bots may be "significantly" higher than 20%, and until the CEO of Twitter proves that the percent is below 5%, the acquisition cannot take place.
Eventually Musk purchased Twitter in October 2022 for 44 billion dollars and renamed it X.
The amount of compensation to shareholders has not yet been estimated, but the lawyer representing their lawyer Francis Bottini estimates that they can full about $2.5 billion. "The position of Muska as the richest man in the planet does not make him unpunished," the lawyer stated. "If you can influence markets through your tweets, you are liable for the harm suffered by investors," he added.
AB, PAP
