Elon Musk’s offer to purchase Twitter for $44 billion is far more than what the company is actually worth, Kevin O’Leary said. “I don’t think it’s worth $10 billion,” O’Leary said to CNBC, emphasizing the need for new management in the company. He urged Musk to “get out the whacking stick” and start fresh with Twitter in order to make his money back. Loading Something is loading.
“Shark Tank” investor Kevin O’Leary said he didn’t believe Twitter was even worth $10 billion and urged Elon Musk to start from scratch if he is to make money on his $44 billion purchase of the social media company.
His advice came shortly after Musk told Twitter he was willing to honor his original offer to purchase the social media platform at $54.20 a share.
That comes after months of the Tesla CEO trying to back out of the deal by accusing the site of being riddled with bots and fake accounts. It’s also just a few weeks ahead of his courtroom showdown against the company.
But O’Leary expressed doubt over the $44 billion valuation, calling Twitter one of the “most poorly-run social media companies” in the business.
“It is full of bots. It’s a poorly run company … If he’s going to take it over, maybe he can get back his $44 billion. I don’t think it’s worth $10 billion,” he told CNBC. “[Twitter] needs new management. I think he should get the whacking stick out if he’s going to own it and just clean house and start from scratch. It’s just a horrible company.”
He estimated that without the hype from Musk’s takeover, Twitter stock would actually be worth somewhere between $12 and $15 a share.
O’Leary added that he sold off shares of Twitter in August, as he believed Musk would negotiate a new price of $35 a share before going forward with the deal.
“Musk would be able to thread the needle through litigation, and do the deal for much less. And I don’t know why he didn’t do that. He didn’t have to pay this ridiculous price,” O’Leary said.