Elon Musk buys chunk of Twitter, is now largest individual shareholder

pcgamer.com:

Tesla CEO and billionaire Elon Musk has purchased 9.2% of Twitter stock, spiking its valuation and making him the largest individual shareholder in the social media company. The amount he paid is not known, but the stake was worth $2.89 billion on Friday, and following the announcement on Monday morning, became worth $3.5 billion (thanks, CNN).

Musk purchased 73,486,938 Twitter shares on 14 March, per a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The filing did not include anything about Musk's future intentions for the company.

Interestingly enough, this purchase came a couple of weeks before Musk 'announced' he was thinking about establishing a new social media platform. He of course took to Twitter while pondering this, writing on March 26:

Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy. What should be done? https://t.co/aPS9ycji37March 26, 2022

The above tweet was followed by a poll, with Musk asking his 80.2 million followers whether they believed Twitter adhered to the values of free speech. After just over two million votes were cast, 70.4% said no.

Musk is, far more than most CEOs, a regular social media user and occasionally something of a troll. He tweets business and life updates, but these are mixed-in with gnomic utterances, memes, and outright shitposting. At times Musk has got into serious hot water, particularly when he tweeted asking if he should take Tesla private: which understandably sent the company's valuation zig-zagging, and resulted in the SEC taking action against him.

While that dispute has been settled, it's resulted in ongoing scrutiny and, as recently as February, Musk's lawyers were railing against