Twitter’s board of directors voted unanimously to adopt a “poison pill” shareholder rights plan that would prevent Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s takeover of the company.
Musk had offered $54.20 per share to make Twitter into a private company.
"This is not a way to make money.... I don't care about the economics at all," Musk said during a TED conference on Thursday in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Instead, Musk said that he wanted to ensure Twitter maintained its position as an online "public square."
"This is just my strong, intuitive sense ... that having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization," Musk said.
The “poison pill” would grant shareholders the right to to buy common stock at a discounted price if any individual or group buys more than 15 percent of Twitter’s shares without board approval.
The board described the plan as "is intended to enable all shareholders to realize the full value of their investment in Twitter" and also said that it will lower the “likelihood that any entity, person or group gains control of Twitter through open market accumulation without paying all shareholders an appropriate control premium or without providing the board sufficient time to make informed judgments and take actions that are in the best interests of shareholders."
The shareholder plan will expire on April 14, 2023. It does not stop the board from accepting a different buyout proposal if the board agrees to it and believes it’s in the interest of the company.
“Taking Twitter private at $54.20 should be up to shareholders, not the board,” Musk said on Thursday.
Musk’s takeover bid came only weeks after he announced ownership of 9.2 percent of Twitter on April 4, becoming the company’s largest shareholder.
Musk was invited to join the board but the offer came with stipulations about how much stock he could own and what he could say publicly about the social media giant. He declined and later hinted at a hostile takeover bid.
(Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat and Passover in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)