What's That Musk-y Smell? X Fraud

 

South Afrikaner fascist and crashing car maker Elon Musk had his day in court, and lost.  From CNBC:

"A jury in California found that Elon Musk defrauded Twitter shareholders during the runup to his $44 billion acquisition of the social media company, according to a verdict issued on Friday.

Total damages could reach up to $2.6 billion, attorneys for the plaintiffs said.

The class action lawsuit, Pampena v. Musk, was originally filed in October 2022, after Musk completed his purchase of Twitter for $54.20 per share. He later renamed the company X, before merging it with his artificial intelligence company xAI, and then with SpaceX, his reusable rocket manufacturer.

'This is a great example of what you cannot do to the average investor -- people that have 401ks, kids, pension funds, teachers, firemen, nurses,' Joseph Cotchett, an attorney for the Twitter investors, told CNBC at the San Francisco courthouse. 'That’s what this case was all about. This was not about Musk. It was about the whole operation.'” (our emphasis)

Musk was accused of manipulating the sale price of Twitter through statements made by him that suggested the actual number of Twitter users was lower due to bots and fake accounts, making the social media site less valuable.  Musk's lawyers announced that they would pursue an appeal, since the evil mogul has money to throw away and his egomania won't take this defeat as the final word.  If the verdict stands, the damages would represent a tiny fraction of the ketamine-gobbling Musk, but would stand as a rebuke for his greed and deceit.