• by Colin Kirkland , Yesterday

Four years ago, Elon Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion, valuing the company's common stock at $54.20 per share.

Last week, a jury in California found that Musk purposefully manipulated the company’s share price and may be ordered to pay former shareholders upwards of $2.6 billion in damages.

At the time of Musk's purchase in 2022, Bret Taylor – then Twitter's Independent Board Chair – stated that the Board “conducted a thoughtful and comprehensive process to assess Musk's proposal with a deliberate focus on value, certainty, and financing.”

In the months prior to accepting Musk's offer, the billionaire entrepreneur began buying company shares while criticizing Twitter in rapid-fire posts, teasing a hostile takeover. He was even reviewed as a potential addition to the Board. However, this consideration was quickly reversed.

Shortly after proposing and signing a merger agreement with Twitter, Musk attempted to cancel the merger and was sued by the social-media company, which accused Musk of covering up an unwanted financial decision with an argument about bots on the platform.

Public-facing statements about the supposed prevalence of fake accounts on Twitter have become the heart of a new judicial decision in a federal San Francisco-based court.

In June 2022, Musk claimed that Twitter was “actively resisting and thwarting his information rights” by allegedly withholding metrics on spam and fake accounts, which the billionaire stated could make up 20% or a “much higher” portion of total users.

On Friday, after two days of deliberation, the jury found that some of Musk’s public claims depicting problems with regard to Twitter’s user metrics ahead of his buyout were devised to artificially lower the price of the company’s stock by a range of $8 to $3 per share between May and October 2022.

According to the jury, Musk's comments were intended to purposefully lower share prices, persuading investors to sell their stock in the company. As a result, Musk will be ordered to repay shareholders the equivalence of the losses, which could reach $2.6 billion in total payouts.

Some Twitter investors who appeared on the stand during the trial said they sold thousands of Twitter shares in 2022 in response to Musk’s negative posts and comments about the platform.

The legal team for Musk has already vowed to appeal the ruling.