hodar

Stabitha_Christie said:

“ It's not clear why Musk failed to do due diligence of the service before offering to buy, which should have included an accurate count of fake users”

Yeah…. His history of being an impulsive jackass certainly doesn’t explain it. 

Umm, you do your Due Diligence by reviewing the SEC forms (10K statements for each quarter).
These are publicly available, and are the OFFICIAL STATEMENT of the company's financials, quarterly expenses, costs, debts, plans and forward mission statements.
They are signed by the CEO and/or the CFO.
These are the forms that Stock Brokers will analyze to set a stock price target, banks will use to determine loan amounts and percentages, and are a base for taxes.  These forms are generally "audited" by a 3rd party, before release.
They are a big deal. A very, very Big Deal.

That's why Elon had a $1 Billion Deposit, so he couldn't walk away.
However, fraud in vitiates everything.  Twitter lied by overstating the actual user base, and instead of the bots being <5% as Twitter claimed, two separate 3rd party audits showed that bots were greater than 19.2% (about 400% higher than claimed).  That's serious, very, very serious.
So, now come the law suits

Elon was defrauded, Twitter lied to him, they lied to the SEC.  Oxley-Sarbanes Act sets up some very severe prison sentences for all involved for this.
So, Elon could walk away, or negotiate a much lower puchase price; due to this fraud
next, we have the stockholders, who will recieve far less share value, because Twitter committed fraud
Finally, we have the advertisers, who overpaid for advertizing, as the consumer base they thought they were reaching, did not exist.

yes, this is catetrophic.

foregoneconclusion said:

hodar said: Seems that Twitter is the one that not only misrepresented themselves, but also committed fraud to both stockholders, as well as advertisers.  I would expect to see a class action lawsuit from stockholders, as well as advertisers, who made business decisions, based upon what is supposed to be accurate data.

Here are some other examples of misrepresentation by another publicly held company:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/04/15/elon-musk-promises/

• March 2016: The Tesla Model 3 will cost $35,000

• January 2017: Full self-driving Tesla cars ready in 6 months

• November 2017: A Tesla Semi truck will arrive by 2019

• April 2019: 1 million robotaxis on the road by 2020

• November 2019: Tesla Cybertruck to begin production in 2021

• April 2022: Tesla’s humanoid robot will be ready for production in 2023

Are these SEC filings?  No, these are company goals.
Delays in production, do they count as criminal acts?  I imagine we would be arresting Intel, Apple, GM and pretty much every other company too.  Missing production goals, and lying about your EXISTING subscriber base are two very different things; but I am sure you aware of this very basic idea.
Twitter committed fraud to every Stock Holder.  The share price is derived by the number of Active Users, this was intentionally overstated.
Twitter committed fraud to every Advertiser.  The cost of advertising is based on the number of potential customers, again this was intentionally overstated.
Do you imagine that they will all just go away?
If Apple overstated their iPhone sales by a few percentage points, what do you suppose would be the repercussions?  These are neither trick nor difficult questions.

lkrupp said:

If the deal falls through I think the SEC would have a good case of fraud to bring against Musk. Looking like this was all theatre from the get-go.

So on your planet, the person who catches the criminal is the one who gets punished?
Please correct me if I am wrong, but I don't believe that Musk filed the SEC report for Twitter.

A pre-closure audit is commonplace before a sale of any company is made.  The audit is generally an accounting of the staff, property, financial, taxes, HR and payroll, compensation packages, benefits packages, Board of Directors compensations, primary Stock Holders and breakdown of Debts and Obligations, along with Revenues and analysis of Cost of Operations.  Exposing fraud, is not a crime.

How are fraudulent SEC filings by Twitter, somehow Musk's fault?  All Musk did was read the forms, and calculate a value based on the reported number of Active Subscribers.

Seems that Twitter is the one that not only misrepresented themselves, but also committed fraud to both stockholders, as well as advertisers.  I would expect to see a class action lawsuit from stockholders, as well as advertisers, who made business decisions, based upon what is supposed to be accurate data.

Secondly, fraud in vitiates EVERYTHING.  If you agree to buy a house that you are told in writing, is 4,000 sq-ft.  You have the architectural drawings on file (analogy with the SEC filings), you have the Realtor's Contract in hand - and it all says 4,000 sq-ft; but you find out that it's actually much less than 4,000 sq-ft - how is it that somehow this is your fault?  How would it be that you are still required to purchase a contract, that was presented to you, fraudulently?  How would you be liable for the Down Payment you made?

Simply said - you would not.  You would be entitled to all of  your money back; and the seller would be on the hook for your time, costs and efforts.  The Realtor would likely be investigated for a breach of ethics (if they exist).  Twitter is the one who lied, Twitter is the one that filed false SEC claims.  Seems pretty clear cut.

Why is society so intent upon blaming technology, for the actions of an individual?  This is the actions, of an individual, who made the decision to track another human illegally, with intent to harass or intimidate.  Whether he used an Apple device, or an Android device, or any other electronic means of doing so - really doesn't matter.

The individual decided to force his will upon an unwilling victim.  Do we blame Black and Decker when I smash my thumb, because I can't hit a nail?  Do we blame Budweiser, if some idiot drinks too much?  How about we blame the individual?