“The bird is free”, says Elon Musk after completing $44 billion Twitter takeover

After six months of public and legal battling over the purchase, Elon Musk finally completed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, according to sources familiar with the situation, placing the world’s richest man in charge of the faltering social network. Twitter will now be a private corporation and shareholders will receive $54.20 per share.

The conclusion brings to an end a story that started in January with the billionaire quietly building up a sizable position in the business, his mounting displeasure with the way it’s handled, and a merger agreement that he later spent months trying to undo.

Mr Musk consented to move forward on his initially suggested terms on October 4, and a Delaware Chancery Court judge granted the two parties until October 28 to complete the transaction. That deadline was met, and now Musk, the CEO of both Tesla and SpaceX, also has the power of Twitter, which he regularly uses but openly criticises and which he has promised to fundamentally alter. Shares of the company are not intended to trade on the New York Stock Exchange anymore.

Musk, 51, shared a video of himself using a kitchen sink to enter the Twitter headquarters and captioned it, “Entering Twitter HQ – let that sink in!” He has changed his title on Twitter to “Chief Twit” and his address to “Twitter HQ.”

He fired the top executives as his first move after the contentious court battle between the two parties.

Chief executive officer Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Sagal, top legal and policy executive Vijaya Gadde, and general counsel Sean Edgett are among those who have been asked to quit. After their initial discussions, it is said that Musk and Agrawal frequently disagreed with one another.

Regulators are closely monitoring the proposed changes, and Twitter users are divided over them. Some are concerned Mr Musk will relax restrictions on hate speech and false information, while others believe the previous administration severely restricted free speech.

“To be super clear, we have not yet made any changes to Twitter’s content moderation policies,” he tweeted. Late on Thursday, Mr Musk posted on the platform, “The bird is free,” while publicly assuring advertisers that he did not want Twitter to turn into a “free-for-all hellscape.”