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Elon Musk decides against buying Twitter – CNBC

The reason was the failure of the company to fulfill several obligations under the contract

Elon Musk EPA-EFE/ALEXANDER BECHER

Elon Musk

© EPA-EFE/ALEXANDER BECHER

NEW YORK, July 9. /TASS/. US billionaire Elon Musk has terminated his deal to purchase Twitter social network, CNBC television channel reported.

According to CNBC, "Musk wants to end his deal to buy Twitter, according to a letter sent by a lawyer on his behalf to the company’s chief legal officer."

A copy of the letter was published on the official website of the US Securities and Exchange Commission. In the letter, attorney Mike Ringler charged that "Twitter has not complied with its contractual obligations."

CNBC reported that Twitter did not provide Musk with relevant business information he requested, as Ringler said the contract would require. Musk previously required an assessment of Twitter’s claims that "about 5% of its monetizable daily active users (mDAUs) are spam accounts."

"Twitter has failed or refused to provide this information," CNBC quoted Ringler as saying. "Sometimes Twitter has ignored Mr. Musk’s requests, sometimes it has rejected them for reasons that appear to be unjustified, and sometimes it has claimed to comply while giving Mr. Musk incomplete or unusable information."

On April 25, Twitter executives announced that Musk would acquire the company for $44 billion. On May 13, Musk announced he's putting his takeover of Twitter "temporarily on hold," saying that he wants more details about how many of the social platform's accounts are fake or spam.

He said he needed to make sure fake accounts "do indeed represent less than 5%" of Twitter's users. Such an estimate was given in the company's report, published on May 2. According to the entrepreneur, there are currently more than 20% of fake accounts on the social network.

According to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, if the billionaire decides to terminate the agreement, he will have to pay the company a $1 billion fine. If Twitter initiates the termination, Musk will receive a compensation. The closing date for the deal is set for October 24.

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