Twitter "reversed startup" after being acquired by Elon Musk

Since Elon Musk took ownership of Twitter, the platform has been rattled by mass layoffs with Musk's new valuation, Twitter has more than halved in value.

According to Reuters, Twitter CEO Elon Musk has just launched a plan for employees to buy shares of the company at a valuation of nearly $ 20 billion. This valuation is less than half of what Musk spent, about $ 44 billion, to acquire this social network.

In December 2022, Musk announced Twitter was "nearly breaking even" in 2023 despite top advertisers cutting spending on the platform after falling to the billionaire.

Musk also predicts Twitter will bring in less than $3 billion this year.

According to data from analytics firm Pathmatics, more than 70 of Twitter's 100 major advertisers didn't buy any ads on Twitter between October 2021 and February 25.

Twitter ad revenue fell 55% in November 2022 from the previous year. Another source said Twitter's revenue was down 40% year-over-year.

However, Mr. Musk has lured some advertisers back by slashing prices. Currently, Twitter's main source of revenue is still advertising.

Since October last year, Twitter has become a private company, no longer listed on the exchange. Therefore, the value of the company is not public. However, with Musk's new valuation, Twitter has more than halved in value.

In the fourth quarter of 2022 business report, Twitter's revenue and profit both plummeted 40% year-on-year. In fact, this is the 8th year Twitter has reported a loss in the 10-year period 2012-2021 and has never made a profit every year since 2019 until now.

The social networking platform is on top of $13 billion in debt from a group of banks led by Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Barclays and Mitsubishi.

The payment of benefits in shares has been mentioned by Musk several times before. When he took over and turned Twitter into a private company, he once reassured employees by announcing that he would pay in stock.
In the new announcement, he also suggested that the remaining employees consider Twitter a "reverse startup," referring to the company's downsizing rather than scaling. According to CNBC, the actual number of employees at Twitter is about 1,300 people.