In what could be an ironic solution to the seemingly never-ending saga of Elon Musk vs. Twitter, a new bombshell report by Bloomberg on Tuesday alleges that Musk will now seek to complete the purchase of the social media platform at the original proposed price of $54.20 per share — for a grand total of around $44 billion.
Patrick Pleul | picture alliance | Getty Images The request to proceed with the purchase was reportedly written in a letter to Twitter on behalf of Musk’s team.
Musk and Twitter were set to square off in court on October 17, and key witnesses were to be named as early as tomorrow should the trial proceed as planned.
Last week, texts from Musk and a number of colleagues and business people (including Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal) were made public which put Musk in a “weaker legal stance” ahead of the trial, according to analysts.
The text dump included messages about how Musk was not interested in management, for example, and it’s been reported that it could be an ugly court battle and was not likely to rule in Musk’s favor.
Related: What is Going on With Elon Musk and Twitter?
The billionaire has been trying to back out of his original bid to purchase the company for months, alleging that Twitter has been inconsistent and untruthful about the number of spam and bot accounts on the website.
Twitter shares were up nearly 13% in a 24-hour period around 12:30 p.m. EST following the news, with reports that shares had spiked upwards of 18% in the same time period when the news broke.
Just after 12:35 p.m. EST, Twitter stock had been halted.
Read here for details on how the battle between Elon Musk and Twitter that began in April ended up here.
This is a developing story.
