Photograph: Win McNamee (Getty Pictures)
Final October, Elon Musk closed on a deal to buy Twitter for a whopping $44 billion. On the time, it was a price-tag that many estimated to be method an excessive amount of cash. Musk, himself, admitted that he and his co-investors might have overpaid for the social media platform. Nonetheless, he soldiered on, decided to remodel his acquisition into an “every part” app that, in response to his beneficiant estimation, might finally be value $250 billion.
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Now, slightly greater than half a yr later, the fruits of Musk’s labor usually are not solely not paying off however appear to be pushing Twitter’s market worth in the wrong way. This week, monetary providers big Constancy estimated in a month-to-month disclosure that the microblogging web site is value about 33 p.c of what Musk initially paid for it—a projection that will put its worth at one thing like $15 billion. Constancy got here up with the analysis based mostly on a markdown of its personal stake within the firm.
Bloomberg, which initially reported Constancy’s evaluation, notes that its “unclear how Constancy arrived at its new, decrease valuation or whether or not it receives any personal data from the corporate.”
Nonetheless the knowledge was acquired, we will all agree that the resultant valuation is…uh, not nice. Below Musk’s management, Twitter has tried various weird moneymaking efforts—together with an ill-fated bid to make individuals pay for profile verification. Twitter has additionally tried to chop prices by firing giant components of its workforce, however the platform has suffered different monetary slings and arrows—together with a significant dip in promoting income.
Musk, himself, appears to be conscious that Twitter’s monetary scenario isn’t nice. In late March, a memo leaked that confirmed the billionaire thought Twitter was then value about $20 billion, or lower than half of what he initially paid for it.