Twitter Accepts Elon Musk's $44 Bln Buyout Deal

(RTTNews) - Social media company Twitter Inc. (TWTR) Monday said it has agreed to be acquired by Tesla Inc. (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk in a deal valued at about $44 billion. Twitter will become a privately held company.

Musk has agreed to pay Twitter shareholders $54.20 in cash for each Twitter share, which represents a 38% premium to Twitter's closing stock price on April 1 which was the last trading day before Musk disclosed his 9% stake in the company.

Bret Taylor, Twitter's Independent Board Chair, said, "The Twitter Board conducted a thoughtful and comprehensive process to assess Elon's proposal with a deliberate focus on value, certainty, and financing. The proposed transaction will deliver a substantial cash premium, and we believe it is the best path forward for Twitter's stockholders."

"Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated," said Musk. "I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential - I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it."

The deal was unanimously approved by the Twitter Board of Directors and is expected to close in 2022, subject to regulatory approvals and other conditions.

Last week, in an SEC filing, Musk had revealed that he had secured commitments for $46.5 billion to help finance the deal. Musk secured about $25.5 billion in debt financing through Morgan Stanley Senior Funding and other firms, and he said he has committed about $21 billion in equity financing. The other participating firms are Bank of America, Barclays, MUFG, Societe Generale, Mizuho Bank and BNP Paribas.

TWTR is currently trading at $51.63, up $2.70 or 5.52%, on the Nasdaq.