Elon Musk reaches deal to buy Twitter for $44B - Brazil’s Supreme Court orders (X) to be fully suspended in the country immediately

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Elon Musk’s X reveals investors in court filing. Sean"AKA" Diddy Combs named as one of the investors.​


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Diddy was one of the investors who helped Elon Musk snag X -- back when it was still called Twitter -- for $44B in 2022 ... according to a newly unsealed list of the platform's shareholders.

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge on Tuesday ordered Elon Musk’s X to unseal the list of shareholders involved with X Holdings Corp., giving the public an official look at the investors who aided his $44 billion purchase of the social media platform previously known as Twitter in October 2022.

Shareholders named in the document include some of Silicon Valley’s most prominent venture capitalists and entrepreneurs — as well as a fund linked with hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs.
The filing lists nearly 100 entities with a stake in X, although many appear to represent different funds controlled by the same firm or person.
Other investors include venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal al Saud; Twitter founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey; and 8VC, a venture capital firm co-founded by Joe Lonsdale, co-founder of intelligence contractor and data analysis platform Palantir.

Lesser-known shareholders listed in the filing include UnipolSai S.P.A., an Italian financial services company based in Bologna. Many of the larger investors had previously been reported, but X had not publicly detailed its stakeholders before. X did not immediately return a request for comment.

X originally filed the list of investors under seal as part of a lawsuit brought in 2023 by former Twitter employees who alleged that the entrepreneur violated their arbitration agreements by failing to pay them certain fees after he bought the company. Attorneys for the nonprofit Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press filed a motion in July asking the court to unseal the records, on behalf of independent technology journalist Jacob Silverman.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston granted Silverman’s motion to unseal the filing and ordered X to file an unredacted copy on the docket. The Washington Post downloaded an unredacted version of the filing from the court website on Wednesday. It’s not clear when it was made available to the public.

Katie Townsend, legal director for the Reporters Committee, said in a statement that the court’s ruling vindicates “the interest of the general public in knowing who owns X.” In an earlier blog post after the motion requesting the records be unsealed was filed, Silverman wrote that “people have a right to know who owns a company with such a prominent role in shaping public discourse, both in the United States and around the world.”

Musk, one of the most successful entrepreneurs in recent history, drew interest from investors large and small after he announced his bid to take over the platform. But there are indications that under his ownership X’s business has struggled, potentially causing investors’ stakes to lose value. X does not routinely release financial data.

Musk has launched new subscription options and an AI chatbot, but also made deep staff cuts and changes to content rules that experts say have made the platform home to more unsavory content that can repel users and advertisers.

This month, X filed suit against ad industry group the World Federation of Advertisers, alleging that its Global Alliance for Responsible Media initiative that offered recommendations on online safety was unfairly harming X revenue by recommending that companies hold back from buying ads on X. Days later, the project announced it would wind down, while still disputing X’s allegations.

Fidelity said in a January filing that one of its mutual funds that had valued its stake in X at nearly $20 million in 2022 now judged it to be worth much less, at $5.6 million. Although banks typically sell off loans provided for takeovers, recent data from PitchBook LCD, a financial data firm, indicates that those that provided $13 billion of credit for Musk’s Twitter deal have not done so, suggesting markets may have soured on X’s prospects. The debt has remained “hung” for longer than any similar deal since the 2008 financial crisis, PitchBook said.

In recent weeks, Musk has seized on the presidential election as a way to attract more users to the platform and claimed last week that downloads of the X app reached an “all-time high.” The tech entrepreneur, who endorsed former president Donald Trump last month, has courted a right-wing audience on the platform, raising concerns about how it will shape online discourse ahead of the election.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/08/21/elon-musk-x-investors/

 
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