The 2024 of X (or Twitter for the more nostalgic) didn’t start well at all, with a very significant loss of value of society. The motivation? Yet another Muskata, a neologism that we decided to coin to indicate the controversial moves of Elon Musk, who in the first months of 2023 formalized the acquisition of the former blue Twitter social network.
Elon Musk’s insult to advertisers
Since the acquisition of the social network, Musk has been at the center of many controversies, since the decision to lay off a large number of employees (almost all responsible for moderation and security), to the choice of privatize the blue checks (from verification mark to paid instrument). And then the gigantic amnesty that brought back to the social network all the accounts previously banned for racial hatred and the spread of fake news. The consequences arrived immediately, with numerous giants (including Apple) deciding to suspend their advertising on the big X’s social network.
The last musk came at the end of 2023, when the CEO of Tesla and Space as usual.
This statement, of course, also had immediate consequences.
X is worth only 28% of its initial value
Fidelitya major private shareholder of the company once known as Twitter, issued a new rating of the company is now worth just 28% of the $44 billion paid for the purchase. A huge drop considering that Musk bought Twitter less than a year ago.
We remind you that a mutual investment fund (such as Fidelity) has the legal obligation to continuously update the value of your assets. Fidelity also reduced the estimated value of its X shares several times (which would now be worth less than 33%). According to Axios, Fidelity’s response would be a direct response to Musk’s attack on advertisers. Fidelity would therefore be writing down its stake in the company.
Here’s how Axios explains the whole story:
“Fidelity has again slashed the value of its shares of X Holdings, which the mutual fund giant helped Elon Musk buy for $44 billion when the company was known as Twitter.
Fidelity believes X is worth 71.5% less than when it was purchased, according to a new disclosure that extends to the end of November 2023 (Fidelity revalues private shares with a one-month lag).
This includes a 10.7% cut in November, during which Musk told X advertisers who were boycotting him to “go f*** themselves” during an onstage interview with the New York Times. ”
