WTF Elon?

[malada]

So Elon Musk bought Twitter for a jillion dollars.

A jillion dollars that he could have used to build more awesome rockets.

A jillion dollars that he could have used to build more electric cars and chargers - ones that everyone could afford.

A jillion dollars that he could have used to give his employees a better standard of living.

You brought returnable rockets into the 21 Century. You brought electric cars into the 21 Century. And you go a buy a social media company?

WTF?

This has got Hyperloop written all over it.

-m

Comments

[siliconshaman]

I read the filing on that.. It's $22.9 billion of his personal equity, and $22.1 billion of loans.. so he's basically gambling his own personal money and taking out a loan to cover the other half. Which will cost him personally, rather than Twitter, roughly a $1.3 billion a year to repay.

He's literally putting his money where his mouth is, without affecting any of his other businesses.

Granted, he could've reinvested that money as you say... but look at it this way. He has now got a few billions worth of advertising on one of the more pervasive social media networks. I strongly suspect that's going to pay off in the long run.

oh.. and to take issue with your comment about Hyperloop. Yeah, that was a loss...but it allowed Musk to prototype equipment and acquire personnel which will be absolutely essential on Mars. So, it's only a loss, for now. A lot of what he does only makes sense in the context of his long-term goal... building a civilisation on Mars. Tesla cars, Hyperloop are short range and long range transport in an airless environment (tesla cars can seal themselves airtight and run on a rebreather) Starlink for communications, SpaceX to get there, and so on.. Twitter makes sense for social media management and advertising (word of mouth is still the best form) to find people willing to go.

He's a smart man, whose real talent is finding even smarter people and getting them to work for him.