Elon Musk’s offer to buy Twitter for $54.20 per share and take the company private has dominated headlines in recent days, with some supporting the tech billionaire’s attempted takeover and others raising concerns about what it might mean going forward. Fellow tech entrepreneur Mark Cuban is one of the latest to weigh in on the matter – and he thinks Musk’s bid for the social-media platform is just his latest jab at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Musk has been in hot water with the SEC since tweeting that he “had funding secured” to take Tesla private at $420 a share in 2018. The SEC alleged he’d made untrue and misleading statements about the state of the electric-car company’s finances, and in the settlement that followed, Tesla was fined $20 million and Musk was fined $20 million, both of which were to be paid to Tesla shareholders for a total $40 million payout. The SEC also imposed a so-called “consent order” on the billionaire, requiring a Tesla lawyer to review his tweets before they’re posted online. According to Musk, the SEC never paid up, so his legal team is trying to terminate the settlement.
Cuban notes that Musk’s Twitter offer echoes the tweet that got him in trouble several years ago; in the letter Musk sent as disclosed in a securities filing, the Tesla and SpaceX founder wrote that “Twitter needs to be transformed as a private company.” Some have also theorized that Musk’s price per share — $54.20 — is a pot joke.
“My conclusion, @elonmusk is f—king with the SEC,” Cuban tweeted. “His filing w/the SEC allows him to say he wants to take a company private for $54.20 Vs. his ‘Am considering taking Tesla private at $420. Funding secured.’ Price go up. His shares get sold. Profit [up] SEC like WTF just happened.”
In a series of earlier tweets, Cuban said he believes that Musk’s offer has opened the door for other tech giants to make their moves and that Twitter will do everything in its power to avoid a sale.
Twitter was down 1.68% as of 10:33 a.m. ET today.
