Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter is in serious jeopardy, three people familiar with the matter say, according to The Washington Post. According to The Washington Post, Musk’s camp concluded that Twitter’s figures on spam accounts are not verifiable.
Talks with investors have cooled in recent weeks as Musk’s camp has raised doubts about the recent data “fire hose” – a trove of data sold to corporate customers – they received from Twitter. Musk’s team’s doubt about the spam figures signal they believe they do not have enough information to evaluate Twitter’s prospects as a business, the people said.
In addition, The Washington Post reported that the terms of the deal mean it wouldn’t be easy for Musk to walk away. Musk has agreed to complete it unless something major happens to Twitter’s business, and legal experts doubt the bot issue would qualify.
Twitter removes more than 1 million spam accounts each day, executives told reporters in a briefing on Tuesday, providing new insight into the efforts to reduce harmful automated bots as billionaire Elon Musk has demanded more details from Twitter, Reuters reported. According to Reuters, Twitter said it does not believe a calculation of [spam] accounts could be performed externally because it would require private information, but declined to comment on the type of data it would provide to Musk.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Twitter officials doubled down on defending the accuracy of their calculation of spam on the platform, addressing an issue that has become a potential stumbling block in Elon Musk’s $44 billion deal to buy the company.
The officials, who asked not to be named, reiterated on a call with reporters Thursday that spam accounts make up less than 5% of the company’s daily monetizable users, which Twitter defines as daily users who are logged in and authenticated by Twitter. They added that it would be difficult for outsider auditors to accurately measure the figure that is based on private user information, such as internet address, geolocation data and contact information, that Twitter doesn’t share.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Twitter executives said that some legitimate users might appear to be fake because they kept automatically generated usernames and never took the additional step of making their username their own. There, private information, not available to the public, can help Twitter determine whether it is real.
The Verge reported that breaking the agreement for Musk to purchase Twitter would mean someone owes someone else $1 billion, as laid out in their original agreement. Legal wrangling over who is at fault and whether or not Musk will be allowed to back out could take a long time to resolve.
If I were to make a guess, I would say that I think Elon Musk will find a way to back out of the Twitter agreement. A man as rich as Elon Musk is unlikely to have concerns over spending $1 billion to exit an agreement that he feels is not worth it to him.