Elon Musk Explores Wall Street Financing for Twitter Bid, Report Says

Musk is reportedly looking for debt financing to back his $43 billion offer.

Mary King Associate Editor

Mary is an associate editor covering technology, culture and everything in between. She recently graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she served as an editor at The Daily Tar Heel and reported for newspapers across the state. You can usually find her decked out in UNC merch and streaming lo-fi hip-hop while she writes.

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Mary King

April 20, 2022 9:13 a.m. PT

Elon Musk recently extended an offer to buy Twitter.

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Elon Musk wants to buy Twitter for $43 billion, but he may need Wall Street's help.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO has been meeting with multiple firms in search of debt financing for his bid, Bloomberg reported Wednesday. Morgan Stanley and Apollo Global Management are reportedly interested, while some private equity firms have ruled out getting involved.

On Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported that Apollo is thinking about participating in a bid for Twitter, though it's unclear if the group would ultimately support Musk or another bidder.

Musk, Twitter's largest individual shareholder, earlier this month proposed paying $54.20 for each share of the influential social media company, an offer that values Twitter at $43 billion. Musk has said he wants to buy Twitter because he thinks the company isn't adhering to the principles of free speech in moderating its content, even though the First Amendment applies to government censorship, not companies.

It's unlikely Twitter will accept Musk's offer, according to some analysts. On Friday, Twitter initiated a "poison pill" defense that makes it more difficult and expensive for a potential buyer like Musk to acquire the company.

"Twitter is too important to be owned and controlled by a single person," early investor Fred Wilson tweeted Thursday.

Morgan Stanley and Apollo Global Management didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.