Alexander Larman

What is Elon Musk up to now?

His rise to success is being checked in unpredictable ways

(Photo: Getty)

Did Elon Musk ever intend to buy Twitter, or was it all another piece of showboating from a man apparently addicted to the spotlight of publicity? After he announced last Friday that he was walking away from the $44 billion deal that he had previously agreed, Twitter has sued him. A lawsuit angrily states that ‘Having mounted a public spectacle to put Twitter in play, and having proposed and then signed a seller-friendly merger agreement, [Mr] Musk apparently believes that he – unlike every other party subject to Delaware contract law – is free to change his mind, trash the company, disrupt its operations, destroy stockholder value, and walk away’. Musk was unperturbed. ‘Oh the irony lol’, he tweeted.

Yet underneath his imperviousness, it seems as if Musk’s inexorable rise to success is being checked in ways that he could never have predicted. It may yet be that he is forced to pay the agreed $54.20

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