The debt that Elon Musk took on from big banks to buy Twitter was the worst deal since the 2007-2008 financial crisis. But when one of the world’s richest and most influential people comes calling, it’s hard to say no if you want more of your business — and your company’s — in the future. But those banks aren’t the only ones financing the Twitter deal.
There are plenty of other investors who moved their stakes from the original Twitter to Musk’s new version of X, or invested to gain influence in whatever the new version is. I’ve known some of them for a long time, including the Saudis, Larry Ellison and Jack Dorsey.
However, thanks to journalist Jacob Silverman and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, the full list of investors is now public. They intervened in the ongoing lawsuit against Twitter/X to make the full list of investors public. Fortunately, the judge found it to be in the public interest. Instead of commenting myself, I’ll just share Silverman’s post and his take on the investor list, which includes not only sovereign wealth funds from the Gulf countries, but also Sean Combs himself.
I forced the judge to reveal the list of X’s shareholders.
A federal judge agreed with me that it is in the public interest to know the identities of Elon Musk’s investors.
In this week’s roundup, we’ve got a great piece on the environmental risks of new semiconductor facilities, an in-depth look at far-right tech influencer Curtis Yarvin, plus the usual labor updates and other news you might have missed.
On Tech Won’t Save Us, I spoke with Molly White about why the cryptocurrency industry is investing so much money in the US election cycle and what they hope to get for it.
Have a great week!
— Paris
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