Twitter: Elon Musk acquires a 9.2% stake in the social media platform
Elon Musk has acquired a 9.2% stake in Twitter, according to the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
The news prompted Twitter shares to see a rise of around 25% during pre-market trading.
Musk, the founder of electric car maker Tesla, bought about 73.5 million Twitter shares on March 14, according to the authority.
The stake is worth $ 2.89 billion, according to Twitter's share price at close of trading on Friday.
This stake makes Musk the largest shareholder in the company, more than four times the stake of Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, who is 2.25%.
Musk is a constant tweeter on the Twitter platform and is followed by over 80 million users, despite his recent announcement that he is seriously considering launching a new social networking platform.
Musk asked his followers a question late last month to see if they believed the social networking platform, Twitter, encourages freedom of expression.
"Freedom of expression is essential for a functioning democracy," he said. "Do you think Twitter adheres so strongly to this principle?"
He asked: "Do we need a new platform?"
Musk regularly uses Twitter to share news about his companies, including "SpaceX" and "Neuralink", and is known for his numerous posts, which have increased his popularity with fans.
Despite this, he had posted some tweets that sparked controversy.
Last year, he tweeted in response to a statement made by the head of the United Nations World Food Program that only 2% of Musk's wealth could help solve world hunger.
Last October, Musk said he would sell $ 6 billion of Tesla stock and donate it to the World Food Program, provided he described "exactly how $ 6 billion will solve world hunger."
Musk also witnessed Tesla's valuation surpassing the $ 1 trillion market value last fall, making it the fifth company to achieve this, behind Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet, the owner of Google. .
Soon after, he asked Twitter users if he should sell a 10% stake in Tesla.
More than 3.5 million Twitter users voted, of which 58% supported the sale of the stock, which resulted in Musk selling around $ 5 billion in the company's stock last November.
