A lawsuit to determine whether Elon Musk should be held liable for tweeting in 2018 regarding financing a takeover of Tesla Inc. drew to a close on Friday, with a lawyer for disgruntled shareholders saying the billionaire is not above the law and Musk’s lawyer saying his client is not a “Twittering monster,” according to Archyde.com.
Elon MuskPhoto: Carina Johansen / AFP / Profimedia
Shareholders accused Tesla’s CEO of misleading them on August 7, 2018, by tweeting that he was considering taking the electric car maker private at $420 per share and that he had “funding secured.”
The price represented a 23% premium to Tesla’s last closing price, valuing the company at $72 billion.
Shareholders also accused Musk of lying when he tweeted later that day that “investor support is confirmed.”
As Musk looked on in a San Francisco federal courtroom, shareholder attorney Nicholas Porritt said “this case is ultimately regarding whether the rules that apply to everybody else should apply to him Elon Musk”, the second richest person in the world.
Musk’s lawyer, Alex Spiro, countered that financing is “not an issue” for a Tesla acquisition, saying his client is not the “rich liar” and “fire-breathing, tweeting monster” that he is the shareholders’ lawyers tried to present it.
The lawsuit is a test of whether the billionaire CEO can be held accountable for his sometimes impulsive use of Twitter.
A nine-person jury will decide whether Musk’s tweets artificially inflated Tesla’s stock price by overstating the deal’s financing status, and if so, by how much.
Investors are seeking billions of dollars in damages from Musk, Tesla and several company executives.
