Nov. 9 (UPI) — Tesla CEO Elon Musk sold $3.95 billion worth of his company stock this week after finalizing his deal to buy Twitter for $44 billion.
Musk sold 19.5 million shares in the transaction, according to documents filed Tuesday with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, meaning the world’s richest man has offloaded nearly $20 billion so far in 2022.
The latest money moves follow the sale of more than $8 billion in Tesla shares in April and another $6.88 billion stock sale in August as Musk was preparing to go to court in an effort to back out of his deal to buy the social media giant.
But then Musk surprised everyone in early October by submitting a new bid to purchase Twitter for the same price he originally agreed to in April.
The billionaire began steadily selling stock following an April 28 tweet that said “No further TSLA sales planned after today.”
News of Musk’s August stock sale led some of his fans to seek insight, with one tagging the CEO in a Twitter post asking if the billionaire was “done selling,” and Musk responded, “Yes.”
“In the (hopefully unlikely) event that Twitter forces this deal to close *and* some equity partners don’t come through, it is important to avoid an emergency sale of Tesla stock,” Musk responded.
In 2021, Musk sold nearly $22 billion in Tesla shares as the value of the company rose by 50%.
Twitter costs billions of dollars to run, and for that Musk has turned to equity investors around the globe to bankroll the newest acquisition.
Several months ago, Musk was known to have financial backing stemming from as many as 19 partnerships in the world of venture capital and cryptocurrencies.
Some of the investors include Binance, Ron Baron’s MANCO, Andreessen Horowitz, former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, and Prince Alwaleed bin Talal bin Adbulaziz of Saudi Arabia, whose stake prompted Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy to call for an investigation into his implications for national security.
With the company losing revenue as advertisers flee the platform, those already invested with Musk have been asked to roll some of their existing shares into the holding company for Twitter.
Tesla shares are also down 46% since this time last year, but financial experts explain that selling shares of the company is the quickest and easiest way for Musk to raise cash to pay back investors.
Since taking over at Twitter on Oct. 27, Musk has also laid off about 50% of the company’s workers and is now seeking to revamp the platform’s user verification process, including a blue checkmark on profiles that will cost $7.99 per month and will soon be available to users in the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand.
Musk recently explained that “once Twitter is set on the right path, I think it is a much easier thing to manage” when compared to his other holdings, Tesla and SpaceX. Musk has also revealed that his tenure at Twitter is only temporary and that someone else would eventually be appointed to serve as the company’s CEO.
