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☆ Twitter founder Jack Dorsey to remain invested in the company under Elon Musk
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-01 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

New York CNN Business —Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey stepped down from the company’s board earlier this year, but he’s staying involved with the social platform following its takeover by Elon Musk. Almost immediately after taking over the company, Musk dissolved Twitter’s board of directors. Later that year, Musk defended Dorsey when he was facing pressure from an activist investor, saying on Twitter, “I support @Jack as Twitter CEO. Dorsey stepped down as Twitter CEO last November and left its board of directors in May. In April, after Musk agreed to buy the company, Dorsey pledged his support for the takeover.

☆ After Elon Musk’s wild weekend on Twitter, will advertisers stick with it?
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-01 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

“I think advertisers are bracing to leave,” said Claire Atkin, co-founder of the adtech watchdog Check My Ads. Most marketers bristle at the thought of having their ads run alongside toxic content such as hate speech, pornography or misinformation. Also on Monday, Angelo Carusone, CEO of media watchdog Media Matters for America, tweeted calling on major Twitter advertisers “to be putting pressure on Twitter right now” to better address the increase in hate and other toxic content. “I think advertisers are going to look at this and say, is the weak Twitter advertising product becoming a better or worse investment? After GM announced its Twitter advertising pause, some users on the platform, including some right-leaning political figures, have called for a boycott of the automaker.

☆ Elon Musk disbands Twitter’s board, cementing control over company
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-31 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +1 min

CNN —Twitter’s board of directors was dissolved on Thursday following Elon Musk’s takeover of the company, according to a securities filing on Monday. Almost immediately after Musk completed his $44 billion deal to acquire Twitter on Thursday, Musk terminated at least four of its top executives, including Agrawal. He also is reported to be planning large layoffs at the company. While Musk has a reputation as an innovative entrepreneur, he is also known for erratic and controversial behavior. This weekend, Musk was widely criticized for tweeting a link to a fringe conspiracy theory about the violent attack on Paul Pelosi, the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

☆ Premarket stocks: A spooky forecast for the future of interest rates
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-31 | by ( Nicole Goodkind | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

New York CNN Business —When will central banks stop raising interest rates? This week, the Federal Reserve is expected to increase rates by 75 basis points for the fourth time in a row. For some time, it was thought that 2023 would bring lower interest rates and a return to dovish monetary policy. Even the Federal Reserve appears confused about when it will stop rate hikes. A possible answer: Wall Street tends to favor big events, but the future of central bank policy may be more nuanced.

CNN —Elon Musk on Sunday gave credence to a fringe conspiracy theory about the violent attack on Paul Pelosi. The new Twitter owner tweeted a link to an article full of baseless claims about Pelosi. Musk, who has 112 million followers on the platform he now owns, posted the baseless story about Pelosi in response to a tweet from Hilary Clinton at 8:15 am ET. He later deleted the tweet around 2 pm, but not before racking up more than 28,000 retweets and 100,000 likes. Linking to a Los Angeles Times story about Pelosi’s alleged attacker, Clinton wrote, “The Republican Party and its mouthpieces now regularly spread hate and deranged conspiracy theories.

One year and billions of dollars later, the so-called metaverse still feels years away, if it ever manifests at all. And Meta’s flagship social VR app Horizon Worlds can feel like a ghost town (albeit a ghost town with laser tag). Meta’s latest headset, the Quest Pro, is its first effort at combining the immersiveness of VR with the real world. The VR headset market is still tiny compared to, say, an established gadget market like console video games. A visitor to the 2022 Tokyo Game Show tests the Meta Quest 2 VR headset.

☆ Elon Musk now owns Twitter. Here’s what he could change
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-28 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

New York CNN Business —After spending months attempting to get out of his deal to buy Twitter, Elon Musk officially owns the hugely influential platform. Musk has said Twitter, under his leadership, would have more lenient content moderation policies. Unbanning Trump and other accountsBut the most striking early change could come from who is and is not allowed on a Musk-owned Twitter. Musk, for his part, has focused on bringing back one of Twitter’s most prominent former users: Trump. The same day he sent his letter to Twitter attempting to revive the deal, Musk was widely panned for comments he made on the platform about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

☆ Trump won’t return to Twitter right away: Musk enlists panel to review suspended accounts
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-28 | by ( Oliver Darcy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

New York CNN Business —Newly minted Twitter owner Elon Musk said Friday afternoon that the social media company “will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints.” That means suspended accounts like the one held by former President Donald Trump won’t immediately return to Twitter. “No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes,” Musk added. Musk has repeatedly stressed his intention to rethink Twitter (TWTR)’s content moderation policies, as well. Musk had previously indicated that he was not a supporter of permanently banishing people from Twitter and that Trump would be permitted to return under his ownership. Musk’s commitment to a moderation council should pause some of those concerns for now.

New York CNN Business —Elon Musk has completed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, the company confirmed in a securities filing Friday, putting the world’s richest man in charge of one of the world’s most influential social media platforms. The confirmation comes after a source familiar with the deal told CNN the deal had closed Thursday night. But Musk’s takeover now raises a host of new questions for the future of the social media platform, and the many corners of society impacted by it. Despite multiple news outlets confirming the changes Thursday night, Twitter staff had still not formally been informed of the changes as of Friday morning, two Twitter employees told CNN. Now he controls a social media platform that shapes how hundreds of millions of people communicate and get their news.

☆ Apple earnings: iPhone maker is weathering the economic downturn better than fellow tech giants
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-27 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: 1 min

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☆ Elon Musk tells advertisers he doesn’t want Twitter to become ‘free-for-all hellscape’
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-27 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

New York CNN Business —Elon Musk attempted to reassure Twitter’s advertisers about the future of the platform in an open letter Thursday, a day before his $44 billion takeover of the company is expected to be completed. On Wednesday, Musk visited Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters and spoke with employees, reportedly telling them he does not in fact plan to cut 75% of Twitter’s staff, despite prior reports. Twitter’s Chief Customer Officer Sarah Personette responded to Musk’s Thursday tweet saying that she had a “great discussion” with Musk on Wednesday. “Our continued commitment to brand safety for advertisers remained unchanged,” Personette said. Musk has previously suggested that he wants to increase Twitter’s subscription revenue to rely less on ads.

☆ Apple earnings: Is the iPhone 14 recession proof?
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-27 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

New York CNN Business —Apple is about to offer its first hints about iPhone 14 sales after weeks of rumors that demand for its latest smartphone lineup could be weaker than initially expected. On Thursday afternoon, Apple will report earnings results for the September quarter, a period that includes about two weeks’ worth of sales of the iPhone 14 lineup. Apple (AAPL) shares briefly dipped last month following a report that the company had abandoned plans to increase production of the iPhone 14 lineup in the second half of this year because of lower-than-expected demand. The higher-cost iPhone 14 Pro model appears to be the most popular of the new models, which is expected to boost average selling prices for iPhones across the board, according to Angelo Zino, senior equity analyst at CFRA research. Apple earlier this week raised the prices for its music and TV streaming services, which could help boost sales going forward.

☆ Meta posts second-ever quarterly revenue decline and hints at cost cutting efforts
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-26 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

For the three months ended in September, Meta (FB) posted revenue of $27.7 billion, down 4% year-over-year and slightly above Wall Street analysts’ expectations. The Facebook parent company posted its first-ever quarterly revenue decline during the June quarter. The company reported net income of nearly $4.4 billion — less than half the amount it made during the same period in the prior year and below analysts’ projections. Meta reported having 2.96 billion monthly active users on its core Facebook app at the end of the quarter, up 2% year-over-year. “We are holding some teams at in terms of headcount, shrinking others and investing headcount growth only in our highest priorities,” Wehner said.

New York CNN Business —Elon Musk plans to visit Twitter’s San Francisco office this week ahead of the expected close of his deal to buy the company, Twitter Chief Marketing Officer Leslie Berland told staff in an email Wednesday. For everyone else, this is just the beginning of many meetings and conversations with Elon.”Berland added that all Twitter (TWTR) employees will hear directly from Musk on Friday. Musk on Wednesday also changed his Twitter bio to “Chief Twit.”Musk is likely to face many questions from nervous employees when he addresses Twitter’s staff. The Washington Post last week reported that Musk told prospective investors in the deal that he planned to cut nearly 75% of the company’s staff, and that Twitter had already planned massive layoffs even if the deal did not go through. Musk had previously discussed dramatically reducing Twitter’s workforce in text messages with friends about the deal, which were revealed in court filings, and didn’t dismiss the potential for layoffs in a call with Twitter employees in June.

☆ Google’s core business is slowing down amid recession fears
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-25 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

New York CNN Business —Google may be the giant in the digital advertising world, but even it is not immune to the impact that the economic downturn and recession fears are having on the online ad market. It reported revenue of nearly $69.1 billion, up just 6% from the same period in the prior year. YouTube’s ad business, which competes with TikTok, was especially hard hit, with revenue declining nearly 2% from the year-ago quarter. High inflation, looming recession fears and the ongoing war in Ukraine have all continued to weigh on the industry. Growth in other areas of Google’s business also appear to be slowing.

☆ Elon Musk must close Twitter deal by end of this week or face trial
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-24 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

New York CNN Business —The clock is ticking for Elon Musk to complete his deal to buy Twitter. ET on Friday to close his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter or face a trial that was previously delayed to allow both parties to close the deal. Musk in April agreed to buy Twitter (TWTR) for $54.20 per outstanding share and then, weeks later, sought to terminate the deal. Bloomberg last week reported that the company had frozen employees’ stock accounts in anticipation of the deal’s closing, and that lawyers for both Musk and Twitter were preparing paperwork to close the deal. Musk, meanwhile, told Tesla shareholders that he was “excited” about Twitter even as he admitted to “obviously overpaying” for it.

☆ The economy may be in better shape than you think...for now
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-23 | by ( Paul R. La Monica | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

The consensus forecast from economists surveyed by Reuters is that GDP grew at an annualized pace of 2.1% in the third quarter. (This will be the first estimate for third-quarter GDP, and there will be several revisions in the coming weeks.) That also means the Fed will likely continue to sharply raise interest rates to finally choke off inflation once and for all. Those rate hikes helped cause a so-called double-dip recession, where the economy suffered two downturns between 1980 and 1982. In other words, the much-hoped-for “soft landing” for the economy could turn out to be a pipe dream.

☆ Twitter stock falls after report says Biden admin weighing security review of Musk ventures
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-21 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

The stock reaction, which rebounded somewhat later in the morning, followed a Bloomberg report that Biden administration officials are in early discussions about possibly subjecting some of Musk’s ventures to national security reviews, including the planned Twitter (TWTR) takeover. It’s unclear what, if any, impact the reported security review could have on completing a deal that has already been subject to months of uncertainty. In a separate report Thursday evening, Bloomberg said that bankers and lawyers for both Twitter and Musk are preparing the paperwork needed to complete the deal. Bloomberg also last week reported that the company had frozen employees’ stock accounts in anticipation of the deal’s completion. On a conference call this week to discuss Tesla’s earnings results, Musk said he was “excited” about the Twitter deal, but also admitted that he is “obviously overpaying” for it.

☆ Tech earnings are coming and they probably won’t be pretty
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-20 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

Apple (AAPL), Amazon (AMZN), Facebook (FB)-parent Meta, Microsoft (MSFT), Twitter (TWTR) and Google-parent Alphabet (GOOGL) will each report earnings results the following week. “People probably should be bracing themselves for these results,” said Scott Kessler, technology global sector lead at research firm Third Bridge Group. Rampant inflation is eating away at consumers’ paychecks and reducing their ability to spend freely on tech products and services. To make matters worse, tech companies must also confront the growing strength of the US dollar, which is currently trading at its highest level in two decades. Many of the issues currently weighing on tech companies are unlikely to let up anytime soon, which is why industry watchers will be paying close attention to the guidance these companies offer for the rest of 2022.

☆ Kanye West’s biggest challenge with owning Parler may come from Elon Musk
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-18 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

After being banned from Twitter following the Jan. 6 insurrection, former President Donald Trump backed Truth Social, an alternative to Twitter. Perhaps the biggest wild card of all comes from West’s friend and fellow erratic rich guy, Elon Musk. The billionaire Tesla CEO appears closer than ever to taking over an already established platform, Twitter, with plans to cut back on its content restrictions. Conservative users uninterested in politics may also avoid the alternative platforms because of other objectionable content they host, according to experts who study the space. “Elon Musk could buy Twitter and say, ‘Trump, you’re back, Kanye, you’re back,’ and then Kanye is stuck owning a relatively defunct, somewhat irrelevant platform,” said Decker.

Twitter, a social network with hundreds of millions of users, “was over a decade behind industry security standards,” he later testified. His concerns, raised privately at first and later in a whistleblower disclosure that became public, would upend one of the world’s most influential social networks and raise new questions about its pending acquisition by the world’s richest man, Elon Musk. A big part of the issue, Zatko told a Senate panel, was that software and e-commerce companies “want to ignore problems as long as possible. When he was hired to join Twitter, Zatko framed the move in terms of the public good. “This wasn’t my first choice,” he previously told CNN.

☆ The econ Nobel offers a timely warning about central banks’ power
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-10 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

New York CNN Business —The Nobel in economics is sort of the step-cousin of the Nobel family. Some scholars really dislike the economics prize, including one of Nobel’s own descendants, who dismissed it as a “PR coup by economists.”But hey, it still comes with a cash prize. In short, his work demonstrates that banks’ failures are often a cause, not merely a consequence, of financial crises. The Nobel committee has been known to play politics (see: that time Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize after being in office for just eight months). And right now, it is using its spotlight to call attention to the high-stakes gamble playing out at central banks around the world, most notably the Fed.

New York CNN Business —Spam and fake accounts are more prevalent on Twitter than on comparable social platforms, according to a data analysis firm hired by Elon Musk as part of his legal battle with Twitter. Bots on Twitter have been central to the dispute over Musk’s initial attempt to get out of the acquisition deal. Cyabra’s analysisCyabra first made waves in May, after Musk’s deal was first announced. Using publicly available data, the company claimed at the time that spam and bot accounts represented 13.7% of accounts on Twitter. Brahmy said Cyabra did not work with the other data analysis firms used by Musk’s team, and he declined to discuss whether or how much Cyabra was paid to perform the commissioned analysis.

☆ The fate of Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter now comes down to the money
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-07 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

What everyone is now waiting on: Musk needs to actually have the money to hand over. Much of the sticking point between Musk and Twitter (TWTR) now appears to be over uncertainty around the status of those financing arrangements. Many legal experts think Musk really is planning to close the deal this time, the most certain anyone has sounded since he first said the deal was “on hold” in May and moved to terminate the agreement in July. Musk is likely trying to help Morgan Stanley market the debt to other investors before telling them to hand him the money to close the deal, according to Lipton. According to the merger agreement, Musk could in theory walk away from the deal with a $1 billion breakup payment to Twitter if his debt financing were to fall through.

☆ How Elon Musk could change Twitter
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-06 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

Musk has said Twitter, under his leadership, would have more lenient content moderation policies. But the most striking early change could come from who is and is not allowed on a Musk-owned Twitter. Musk, for his part, has focused on bringing back one of Twitter’s most prominent former users: Trump. “There are exceptions … but generally permanent bans are a failure of ours and don’t work,” he said. The same day he sent his letter to Twitter attempting to revive the deal, Musk was widely panned for comments he made on the platform about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

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