Musk borrowed $1 bn from SpaceX as he bought Twitter for $44 bn: Report

SAN FRANSCISCO:  Tesla CEO Elon Musk reportedly borrowed $1 billion from his space company SpaceX in October last year in the same month when he finally acquired Twitter for $44 billion.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Musk tapped SpaceX “for a $1 billion loan around the time he was acquiring the social-media company formerly known as Twitter”.

SpaceX approved the $1 billion loan in October and Musk “drew all of it down the same month”, according to the report, citing documents.

“Rocket maker has lent the executive money on several occasions over the past few years,” the report noted.

Neither SpaceX nor X (formerly Twitter) immediately responded to the report.

Twitter in April last year announced for the first time that it had entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by an entity wholly owned by Musk, for $54.20 per share in cash in a transaction valued at approximately $44 billion.

The purchase price represented a 38 per cent premium to Twitter's closing stock price on April 1, 2022, which was the last trading day before Musk disclosed his approximately 9 per cent stake in Twitter.

After months of high-voltage drama, Musk finally bought it in October, after raising money from banks and a close circle of wealthy friends.

The Tesla CEO gave up on the borrowing plan and contributed more cash.

In the end, Musk sold roughly $15.5 billion worth of shares in Tesla in two waves.

The billionaire personally paid the transaction a little over $27 billion in cash.

As part of the agreement, Larry Ellison, the co-founder of Oracle, wrote a $1 billion cheque in addition to the $5.2 billion from investment organisations and other sizable funds.

The Qatar Investment Authority, which controls Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, Qatar Holding, also contributed money.

Nearly $13 billion of the remaining funds are secured by bank loans, including Morgan Stanley, Bank of America and others.