Jury finds Elon Musk misled investors during Twitter purchase, absolves him of some fraud claims

A jury in San Francisco has determined that Elon Musk is liable for defrauding investors by deliberately driving down Twitter’s stock price in the months leading up to his $44 billion acquisition of the company in 2022. The civil trial centered on whether Musk’s tweets and podcast comments in May 2022 intentionally misled shareholders, causing them to sell their shares at a loss. While the jury found Musk liable for misleading investors with two specific tweets – including one stating the deal was “temporarily on hold” – they absolved him of intentionally scheming to defraud investors and found no wrongdoing in a statement made on a podcast.

The jury awarded shareholders approximately $2.1 billion in stock damages and $500 million in options. Plaintiffs’ attorney Joseph Cotchett hailed the verdict as a victory for investors and a demonstration that even wealthy individuals are subject to the law. Musk’s legal team, however, plans to appeal, citing previous victories and characterizing the verdict as a “bump in the road.”

The trial heavily focused on Musk’s claims regarding the number of bot accounts on Twitter, which he alleged were significantly higher than the 5% disclosed by the company. Musk used this claim as justification for attempting to back out of the purchase agreement, ultimately leading to a court battle in Delaware before he agreed to proceed with the original deal. The core question was whether Musk’s statements were a deliberate attempt to depress Twitter’s share price, and while the jury found misleading statements were made, they did not find evidence of a deliberate scheme.

(Source：Santa Rosa Press Democrat)