Billionaire and Tesla Inc CEO Elon Musk has sold $3.95 billion in shares of the electric vehicle company, just days after completing his $44 billion purchase of Twitter Inc. According to filings published by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Musk released 19.5 million shares between Friday and Tuesday, bringing his net worth below $200 billion.
Notably, Musk with the latest sell-off has sold nearly $20 billion in Tesla shares this year. In April, the world’s richest man sold $8.4 billion in Tesla stock, followed by another $6.9 billion in August.
The tech giant previously stated on social media that “no further Tesla sales are planned” after April 28. Musk promised $46.5 billion in equity and debt financing for the Twitter deal, which covered the $44 billion deal and closing costs.
No further TSLA sales planned after today
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 29, 2022
Banks such as Morgan Stanley and Bank of America provided $13 billion in debt financing, while Musk’s $33.5 billion equity commitment included a $4 billion stake in Twitter.
He reportedly raised $7.1 billion from equity investors such as Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison and Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal.
However, Musk still had to raise another $2-$3 billion to complete the financing, and the latest share sell-off could be a step in that direction.
Notably, Twitter is facing tough times as several major advertisers, including Volkswagen Group and the Danish brewing company Carlsberg Group, have suspended expenses on the platform since Musk took over.
Following Musk’s takeover, the company has told advertisers that its daily user growth has reached an “all-time high.” Twitter recently reported 237.8 million mDAUs and a 16.6% year-on-year increase in its second quarter.
Musk stated last week that Twitter’s revenue has plummeted due to activist groups putting undue pressure on its advertisers.
“Twitter has experienced a massive drop in revenue as a result of activist groups pressuring advertisers, despite the fact that nothing has changed with content moderation and we did everything we could to appease the activists,” Musk tweeted.
Twitter has had a massive drop in revenue, due to activist groups pressuring advertisers, even though nothing has changed with content moderation and we did everything we could to appease the activists.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 4, 2022
Extremely messed up! They’re trying to destroy free speech in America.
Recently, Tesla CEO Elon Musk defended his decision to lay off Twitter employees, claiming that the microblogging platform was losing more than $4 million per day. “Regarding Twitter’s force reduction, there is no choice when the company is losing over USD 4M per day.” “Everyone exited was offered three months of severance, which is 50% more than is legally required,” he tweeted.
Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 4, 2022
Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% more than legally required.
On November 5, Twitter started rolling out Twitter Blue at the rate of $8. Initially, the feature is available only for iOS users from the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the UK. On the app’s page on Apple App Store, the new version 9.34.3 was released on Saturday, last week.
Meanwhile, Tesla’s stock price has dropped by more than 50% since the beginning of the year. Tesla is also reportedly recalling nearly 40,000 vehicles in the United States due to a potential power-steering issue.
