Tesla Stock Rises As Elon Musk Sells $6.9 Billion Worth of Shares

“It is crucial to avoid an emergency sale of Tesla stock,” Musk wrote, “in the event that Twitter compels this deal to close, which is hopefully improbable, and certain equity partners don’t come through.”
The announcement that Tesla (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk had sold approximately $7 billion worth of stock in order to set aside cash for his contentious purchase of Twitter caused the company’s shares to rise on Wednesday (TWTR).
According to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Musk sold 7.92 million shares between August 5 and August 9, resulting in a profit of around $6.9 billion. After sales of approximately 8.5 billion in early April, he still controls approximately 155 million shares of the clean energy carmaker, which accounts for 15% of the company.

Musk claimed that he wanted to avoid a “emergency sale” of Tesla stock in the event that “Twitter forces this deal to close *and* some equity partners don’t come through” on the $44 billion transaction. He took advantage of a 47% rally in Tesla shares between late May and August 5, when the first sale was made, in order to accomplish this goal.

He also stated that he would repurchase the stock in the event that the Twitter deal, which is scheduled to be heard by a judge from the Delaware court system in the middle of October, is finally unsuccessful.
During the late morning session of trading on Wednesday, Tesla shares were marked 2% higher to reach a price of $868.20 a share. In the meantime, Twitter shares increased by 3.4% to $44.30 per share.
Since the beginning of July, Musk has been in a public dispute with Twitter regarding the number of accounts on the social media platform that are referred to as “fake” or “bots.” Musk believes that these accounts constitute a material change to the terms of the merger that he agreed to in the spring.

Twitter, for its part, is suing Musk to force him to purchase the group for $44 billion, or $54.20 per share. In court papers published last week, Twitter argued that the idea of a “billionaire founder of multiple companies, advised by Wall Street bankers and lawyers” being “hoodwinked into signing a $44 billion merger agreement” is “as implausible and contrary to fact as it sounds.” Twitter is suing Musk to force him to purchase the group for $44 billion.

Twitter was forced to manage a slowdown in worldwide ad spending and the uncertainty tied to Musk’s disputed takeover, which resulted in the company posting an unexpected loss for the second quarter late last month.
The company stated that this was due to “headwinds in the advertising industry associated with the macroenvironment as well as uncertainty related to the pending acquisition of Twitter by an affiliate of Elon Musk.” Group revenues decreased by 1% to $1.14 billion, again falling short of the Street forecast of a $1.315 billion tally. Twitter said that this was because of “uncertainty related to the pending acquisition of Twitter by an affiliate of Elon Musk.”

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