Elon Musk, chief executive officer (CEO), Tesla, has notified co-investors who committed to help fund his $44-billion Twitter acquisition that he plans to close buyout of the social media firm by Friday (October 28), quoting sources privy to the matter, Reuters reported.
According to the news agency’s report, equity investors, including Sequoia Capital, Binance, Qatar Investment Authority, and others have received the requisite paperwork for the financing commitment from Musk’s lawyers, the source said. The move by Musk is a clear sign yet that he plans to comply with a Delaware court judge’s deadline to complete the transaction by Friday.
The banks that committed to fund Musk’s buyout of Twitter have finished putting together the final debt financing agreement and are in the process of signing the necessary documents, according to a Bloomberg News report.
Musk pledged to close the deal on a video conference call on Monday with bankers who are helping fund the deal, according to the report.
Twitter, however, declined Reuter’s request to comment. Musk’s lawyers were not immediately available for comment.
Shares of Twitter jumped on the news and were trading up 3 per cent at $52.95 on Tuesday, closer to Musk’s offer price of $54.20.
Musk has pledged to provide $46.5 billion in equity and debt financing for the acquisition, which covers the $44 billion price tag and closing costs.
Banks, including Morgan Stanley and Bank of America Corp, have committed to provide $13 billion of debt financing to support the deal.
Equity investors, including Oracle Corp co-founder Larry Ellison, and Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, will pitch in with $7.1 billion.
The closure of the deal will put to rest months of speculation that the Tesla CEO would abandon the deal.
Musk has touted himself as an advocate of free speech and has been critical of Twitter’s approach to monitoring violent or hateful content, which has led to bans on many prominent conservative voices.
Meanwhile, after reports emerged that Elon Musk is planning “to cut 75 per cent of Twitter staff if he takes over”, employees at the micro-blogging platform warned the world’s richest man that mass layoffs would be “reckless”. The social media platform tried to quell concerns of employees over reports of Tesla chief laying off the workforce as part of his takeover and clarified to employees that there haven’t been plans for companywide layoffs since it signed a deal to be acquired by the billionaire.