Elon Musk would have to pay a fine of 1,000 million if in the end he does not buy Twitter

Since Elon Musk signed an agreement with Twitter a month ago committing to buy 100% of the shares for 44 billion dollars, many things have happened.

Musk’s initial momentum has lost strength, and he has been making excuses for several days not to close the purchase. The main one refers to the amount of spam and bots on the platform, a number that was initially estimated at 5% of all users, while experts believe it could reach 15% or more.

Twitter posted on its account that Elon Musk signed the agreement at the time opting not to ask questions about the company’s business, so it makes no sense that he now wants to close a deal with his “best and last” offer, when he has already defined that would pay $54.20 per share (right now they are worth 30% less).

Musk tweeted Tuesday that Twitter Chief Executive Parag Agrawal has refused to show evidence of his company’s estimate and that the deal cannot move forward until he does. The problem is that when he signed the agreement he made no effort to get information about the problem.

Twitter reports:

Mr. Musk did not request to enter into a confidentiality agreement or search Twitter for any non-public information about Twitter.

The fact is that Twitter investors seemed convinced that there would be no further discussion. Surely they have already celebrated the sale of Twitter in style, but now everything is up in the air, because Musk already suggested on Monday that the deal could be done at a lower price, although he has not officially reported that he wants to renegotiate the agreement.

Legal experts have said Musk would likely lose in court if he tried to walk away from the contract, but litigation would be protracted and cast uncertainty over Twitter’s business. Either way, Musk is contractually obligated to pay a $1 billion breakup fee, and Twitter can still sue him to force Musk to complete the deal and get a settlement.

Twitter already said at the time that 5% of bot and spam accounts was estimated, so it never lied about it.

Musk’s representatives did not respond to requests for comment, but Musk will likely follow up with the story on his own Twitter account soon.