Elon Musk Testifies in Twitter Acquisition Lawsuit

Elon Musk testified in a San Francisco federal court on Wednesday, defending his 2022 social media posts about acquiring Twitter, now known as X, against allegations from shareholders that the statements manipulated the company's stock price and caused them financial losses.

The lawsuit, filed in October 2022 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, represents investors who sold Twitter shares between May 13 and October 4, 2022, before Musk completed the $44 billion purchase. Plaintiffs claim Musk violated federal securities laws by making false and misleading statements to drive down the stock price, allowing him to renegotiate or escape the deal at a lower cost. Musk, who completed the acquisition at the original $54.20 per share price, maintains his comments stemmed from genuine concerns about fake accounts on the platform and were not intended to influence markets.

Musk took the stand wearing a black suit and tie, addressing a key tweet from May 13, 2022, in which he wrote that the deal was "temporarily on hold" pending verification that spam and fake accounts represented less than 5 percent of users. The post, made in the early morning hours...