Despite the ongoing feud between Elon Musk and Parag Agrawal, the Twitter board is eager for the $44 billion takeover to proceed because it is in the “best interests of all shareholders,” according to media reports on Wednesday.
“We intend to close the transaction and enforce the merger agreement,” the board said Tuesday in a statement to Bloomberg.
Goldman Sachs Group Inc and JPMorgan Chase & Co may earn a total of $133 million in fees for advising Twitter on the acquisition, but only if the transaction is completed.
On Tuesday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk stated that the $44 billion deal at $54.20 per share “cannot move forward” until Twitter CEO Agrawal demonstrates the actual bot numbers.
While Twitter claims to have less than 5% fake/spammy accounts on its platform, Musk believes the figure could be as high as 50% and wants Agrawal to come clean about it.
On Monday, at a tech conference in Miami, a frustrated Musk even stated that a viable deal at a lower price would not be “out of the question,” implying that Twitter may be concealing the actual number of users from its advertisers.
Musk claimed that Twitter may have at least four times the number of fake accounts disclosed in its US SEC filing, and he asked the commission to investigate the microblogging platform’s claim.
Meanwhile, according to an SEC filing, Musk will be required to pay Twitter a $1 billion termination fee if he abandons the $44 billion takeover deal.
According to the filing, if the microblogging platform terminates Musk’s takeover deal, it will be required to pay the same amount.
“Upon termination of the Merger Agreement under specified limited circumstances, Twitter will be required to pay Parent a termination fee of $1 billion,” according to the SEC filing.
“Musk will be required to pay Twitter a termination fee of $1 billion,” if he cancels the deal.
Morgan Stanley and other financial institutions have committed to providing $13 billion in financing, as well as $12.5 billion in margin loans to Musk, against his shares in Tesla and other companies, as part of the agreement.
Musk will provide approximately $21 billion in funding on his own.
