Musk’s plan to buy Twitter has worried politicians around the world.
Joe Skipper Reuters
Elon Musk accused Twitter of “resisting and thwarting” his right to information about fake accounts on the platform, calling it a “clear substantial violation” of the terms of their merger agreement in a letter to the company on Monday.
“Mr. Musk reserves all rights arising from this, including his right not to execute the transaction and his right to terminate the merger agreement,” said a letter signed by Skadden’s lawyer Mike Ringler.
Shares of Twitter fell 5% on Monday morning.
Musk wrote on Twitter last month that his $ 44 billion purchase of the company would not continue until he received more information about the number of fake accounts in the service. Some analysts have interpreted the move as a tactic to negotiate a lower price.
He said his team would take a random sample to calculate the number of fake accounts, but Twitter’s chief executive later explained that non-public information would be needed to get the exact number. Twitter executives told employees that “there is no such thing as” postponing the deal, according to Musk, according to a report in Bloomberg.
In a letter Monday, Musk’s lawyer wrote that the merger agreement required Twitter to provide the information Musk requested, and disputed the company’s alleged claim that it was only required to provide information on the limited purpose of helping complete the transaction.
“On the contrary, Mr Musk has the right to search, and Twitter is required to provide information and data on, inter alia, ‘any reasonable business purpose related to the transaction,'” the letter said.
“At this point, Mr. Musk believes that Twitter is transparently refusing to fulfill its obligations under the merger agreement, which raises further suspicions that the company is withholding the requested data due to fears about what Mr. Musk’s own analysis of this data will do. reveal, “she continues.
According to the letter, Musk will agree to ensure that anyone reviewing the data is bound by a non-disclosure agreement and will not use any “competitively sensitive information” if the deal is not completed.
Twitter did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
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