Tesla CEO Elon Musk submitted an offer to completely buy Twitter for an estimated $43 billion
Elon’s takeover attempt comes shortly after scooping a 9.2% stake in the social media giant in March
Musk wants to take the company private and says the offer is final
FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried believes the platform could feature more Web3 operability in the near future
Dogecoin’s price pumped following the news
After purchasing $2.93 billion worth of Twitter shares, Elon Musk has offered to buy Twitter and take the company private to unlock the full potential of the platform. Musk announced the $43 billion buyout bid via a tweet on Thursday.
The takeover offer follows concerns from Musk regarding free speech on the social platform. Elon has published a few tweets asking users to share their thoughts on Twitter’s censorship and if a decentralized social network was needed. ‘
Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy.
What should be done? https://t.co/aPS9ycji37
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 26, 2022
If You Can’t Beat Them, Buy Them
At the time, Elon had already filled a massive purchase of Twitter stocks and initiated the acquisition of 9.2% of the social giant. Despite buying a controlling portion of the company’s shares, CEO Parag Agrawal revealed that Musk turned down a board appointment scheduled to take effect on April 9, 2022.
Barely a week later, the Tesla boss revealed a glimpse of plans to transform Twitter. In a letter to Bret Taylor, Chairman of the Board, Elon said:
I invested in Twitter as I believe in its potential to be the platform for free speech around the globe, and I believe free speech is a societal imperative for a functioning democracy. However, since making my investment I now realize the company will neither thrive nor serve this societal imperative in its current form.
Twitter needs to be transformed as a private company. As a result, I am offering to buy 100% of Twitter for $54.20 per share in cash, a 54% premium over the day before I began investing in Twitter, and a 38% premium over the day before my investment was publicly announced. My offer is my best and final offer and if it is not accepted, I would need to reconsider my position as a shareholder.
As of the time of writing this report, representatives from the social giant have now released any statement or response to the hefty buyout offer.
Decentralized Twitter and Dogecoin Integration
Following the news, FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried weighed in with thoughts about a decentralized social network. According to SBF, leveraging on-chain technology could merge tweets and direct messages while also giving users more control over who has access to their timeline.
SBF added that decentralizing the platform also makes smart contract operability for solutions like monetization, payments, and NFTs easier as everything would be on the blockchain.
3) Monetization comes in two forms:
a) tweet level; the underlying protocol charges something per message. At ~500m tweets/day, $0.01/tweet would replace half of Twitter’s revenue; $0.001/tweet would replace their profit.
b) UI level; the UI could monetize as well.
— SBF (@SBF_FTX) April 14, 2022
Considering Elon Musk’s love for the popular crypto token Dogecoin, we might see an immediate integration if the takeover is successful. Dogecoin’s price already reacted to the news with a slight pump in the last few hours.
Twitter already features support for Ethereum tips and Bitcoin payments via the Lightning network.
