Los 40 USA
NewslettersSign in to commentAPP
spainSPAINchileCHILEcolombiaCOLOMBIAusaUSAmexicoMEXICOlatin usaLATIN USAamericaAMERICA

LATEST NEWS

How much money does Twitter make in a year and what percent does Elon Musk own?

Billionaire Elon Musk has sealed a mammoth $44 billion deal with Twitter to take it private, and is now the owner of the social media company.

Update:
Billionaire Elon Musk has sealed a mammoth $44 billion deal with Twitter to take it private, and is now the owner of the social media company.
CONSTANZA HEVIAGetty

Elon Musk, the richest person in the world, has bought Twitter for $44 billion and taken it private after months of wrangling with its previous owners. The billionaire’s wealth is tied to his stakes in Tesla and Space X and has had no experience running a social media firm.

Twitter’s performance through the years

According to Macrotrends, Twitter’s revenue for 2022 was a little over $5 billion, which represented an increase of almost 37%.

Here are the revenue figures for Twitter for the past years.

YearRevenue (Millions of USD)
2021$5,077
2020$3,716
2019$3,459
2018$3,042
2017$2,443
2016$2,530
2015$2,218
2014$1,403
2013$665
2012$317
2011$106
2010$28

*Source: Macrotrends

Musk’s fund-raising efforts

To finance the purchase of the company, Musk had to put up a total of $46.5 billion in equity and debt financing to cover the price of Twitter and the closing expenses. To cover the amount, several banks, among them Morgan Stanley and Bank of America, promised to provide debt financing to the tune of $13 billion. This debt would be recorded in Twitter’s accounts.

This left his $33.5 billion equity pledge (72% of the amount needed), which is a lot more cash than is involved in usual buyouts. According to Reuters, this includes his existing 9.6% holdings in Twitter, which is good for $4 billion, and $7.1 billion which he obtained from equity investors.

READ ALSO:

Musk came up with $20 billion in cash, part of the amount coming from sales of his Tesla shares. It is not immediately clear how he covered the balance of approximately $2 billion to $3 billion.

The businessman has said that taking over Twitter was “not a way to make money.” He said he merely wanted to enable people to speak more freely on the social media platform.