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Elon Musk's X (formerly Twitter) will enter its flop era in 2024. A recent analysis by Fidelity, one of Musk's X Holdings shareholders, found that the company had lost 71.5 percent of its value since Musk purchased the social media platform.
According to Axios, the November 2023 disclosure of the investment fund – which contributed over $300 million to Musk's Twitter acquisition – has reduced the value of his shares in the company. The new figure includes a 10.7 percent cut over the month. Musk told advertisers to go fuck themselves at the New York Times' DealBook Summit.
The analysis also comes a year and a month after Musk acquired Twitter for $44 billion and renamed the platform X in July. Fidelity's estimate reduces that value to about $12.5 billion. (Musk's own estimate was $19 billion, according to Fortune in October.)
In September, Fidelity had reduced the value by 65 percent in the first 11 months. (It is important to note that other X shareholders may value their shares differently than Fidelity.)
Musk's reign over X has been turbulent, to say the least. After the billionaire acquired Twitter in October 2022, he promised advertisers that the company would not become a “hellscape for everyone” following his acquisition. A few months after he took over the social media platform, The New York Times published a report showing that hate speech on the platform had increased dramatically since his takeover.
In November, a report from watchdog group Media Matters found that ads for brands like Apple, Bravo and Amazon had appeared on X alongside white nationalist hashtags like #WLM (White Lives Matter) and #KeepEuropeWhite. Following the report, X advertisers Disney, Apple, Lionsgate, Comcast/NBCUniversal and IBM severed their ties to the platform.
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Last week, X failed to block a California law requiring social media companies to disclose their content moderation policies. U.S. District Judge William Shubb denied the company's motion Thursday in an eight-sentence ruling.
“While the reporting requirement imposes a significant compliance burden on social media companies, it does not appear that the requirement is unwarranted or unduly burdensome in the context of First Amendment law,” Shubb wrote, according to Portal.