Buying Twitter Wouldn't Make Sense 'If We're Heading Into World War 3', Elon Musk Reportedly Said

In July, Elon Musk backed out of the deal reached in April with Twitter whereby the South African-born American entrepreneur would buy all of the social media company's shares for a total of $44Bln. Twitter has since sued Musk for failing to honor his obligations.

Elon Musk was prompted to "slow down" his buy-out of Twitter because of fears the world was “heading into World War 3”, Business Insider reported.

Private text messages were purportedly sent by Musk on 8 May to a banker at Morgan Stanley, which was financing part of the $44Bln Twitter purchase deal.

In these messages, the billionaire Tesla chief executive cited an upcoming speech from Russian President Vladimir Putin, coinciding with Russia's 77th anniversary of the country's victory over Nazi Germany on 9 May. Putin had said on the day that Russia's decision to begin a special military operation in Ukraine on 24 February was the "only right decision" amid the West’s preparations for an “invasion of Russia."

"Let's slow down just a few days. Putin's speech tomorrow is really important. It won't make sense to buy Twitter if we're heading into World War 3," Twitter's lawyer reportedly said while reading out Musk's texts during a court hearing on 6 September.

Twitter's lawyer said the texts proved that Musk was in contractual breach and had backtracked on the deal because of personal financial concerns.

Musk’s lawyer, Alex Spiro, was cited as denouncing the characterization of the texts in court as "utter nonsense”. He claimed this would become evident after publication of the “full text chain”. Spiro argued during the hearing that Twitter has not found any evidence to support its theory, saying:

“Their theory about what really happened isn't what really happened.”

Elon Musk sealed a deal to buy Twitter and take it private in April, promising sweeping changes to the site. However, he backed out in July, alleging that the company had deliberately understated its fake and spam accounts. Purging the platform of bots and verifying all human users were among the changes Musk had promised to implement after effectively turning Twitter back into a private company.

Twitter sued Musk to enforce the contract, with the world’s richest man countersuing. The court battle is set to go to a five-day trial in early October.