Musk violated one of the key provisions of the securities law designed to protect shareholders. I am a corporate law/securities lawyer. It is well established law that one has to make a public report with the Securities and Exchange Commission when they have more than 5% of the stock of a public company. When one is doing a public takeover, you time the moment that you go over 5% carefully and after you cross that threshold, there is race to buy as much stock as possible.
Elon Musk ignore this statutory requirement. The court is right that Musk broke the law and has no excuse. By breaking the law, Musk admits that he save himself $150 million in the takeover of Twitter, Inc. See https://www.democraticunderground.com/100220993248
Musk is trying to settle this judgement
Elon Musk and SEC in talks to settle lawsuit over Twitter deal
— CNBC (@cnbc.com) 2026-03-17T19:47:05Z
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/03/17/elon-musk-sec-in-talks-to-settle-government-lawsuit-over-twitter-deal.html
Elon Musk is in talks with the Securities and Exchange Commission to settle a lawsuit filed by the regulator last year accusing the world’s richest person of violating securities law in the run-up to his Twitter buyout.
In a court filing on Tuesday, the SEC revealed that it is “engaged in discussions of a potential resolution that would mean further proceedings might not be necessary” with Musk.
The SEC initially filed the suit in January 2025, and the case is proceeding in a federal court in Washington, D.C. A separate, class-action lawsuit filed by former Twitter investors against Musk is now winding its way through a federal court in San Francisco, with a jury expected to deliberate soon.
Musk, who is CEO of Tesla
and SpaceX, purchased Twitter for $44 billion in late 2022 and changed its name to X the following year. Prior to the acquisition, he’d built up a position in the company of greater than 5%, which would’ve required disclosing his holdings to the public within 10 calendar days of reaching that threshold. He was late to file that disclosure.
The SEC said in its complaint that Musk’s failure to disclose the stake allowed him to buy shares at “artificially low prices,” putting other investors at a disadvantage.
This litigation is separate from the private lawsuit described in the OP
= new reply since forum marked as read