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Twitter Is Now Worth Just 33% of Elon Musk’s Purchase Price · Elon Musk Podcast

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  Hi everybody and welcome back to the Elon Musk podcast.
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  Now Twitter, the renowned social media platform once considered
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  the heartbeat of the digital world.
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  Has experienced a steep downfall in value.
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  Purchased by Elon Musk, the techno entrepreneur and CEO,
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  SpaceX and Tesla, the platform's value has plummeted to 1/3 of
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  the acquisition price, as revealed by Fidelity's recent
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  markdown of its equity stake in Twitter.
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  Now Elon Musk, who once saw Twitter as an opportunity to
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  push the boundaries of social media, has confessed that the
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  acquisition was not as fruitful as he had envisioned.
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  Now purchased for an astronomical $44 billion,
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  including $33.5 billion in equity, Twitter's value has
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  halved, according to Musk. The exact methodology by which
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  Fidelity determine the markdown remains undisclosed, leaving
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  unanswered questions about whether they had access to any
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  non public information from Twitter now.
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  The first signs of decline emerged in November when
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  Fidelity reduced the value of its Twitter stake to 44%.
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  Of the original purchase price, and this initiated a series of
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  further markdowns in December and February, marking A troubled
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  fiscal trajectory for the platform.
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  And since Musk took control, Twitter's financial health has
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  been precarious, saddled with $13 billion of debt.
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  The company faced A downturn marked by erratic decision
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  making, challenges and content moderation, and consequential
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  50% decline in advertising revenue, as revealed by Musk in
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  March. In an attempt to supplement this
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  loss with the sales from Twitter, Blue subscriptions fell
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  flat as less than 1% of Twitter's monthly users opted
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  for the service by the end of March.
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  And while Twitter remains silent, failing to respond to
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  requests for comment, Musk's investment in the platform has
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  dwindled to $8.8 billion. The financial downturn is not
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  gone unnoticed, with the Bloomberg Billionaires Index
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  using Fidelity's valuation. Indicating a dip in Musk's $187
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  billion fortune by about 850 million.
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  Now, Despite these financial tribulations, Musk's wealth has
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  grown by more than $48 billion this year, primarily attributed
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  to a 63% surge in Tesla's share price.
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  Now, the initial optimism that surrounded Musk's acquisition of
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  Twitter in late October was shortlived, and the platform
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  experienced a surge in users with app downloads.
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  Growing by nearly 10% in November now, however, daily
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  active users barely budged, showing an increase of less than
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  1% from the previous month. And despite this, must proclaim
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  the platform's usage to be at an all time high, with the actual
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  figure only 0.8% higher than Twitter's previous daily user
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  high in June of 2022, Musk has made major alterations to
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  Twitter's operations and functionality.
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  While forecasting the app to reach 1 billion monthly users by
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  2024, however, the grandeur of his prediction contrasts sharply
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  with the reality and is Per data analysis from Apptopia Data a I
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  and Sensor Tower, user engagement on Twitter has shown
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  signs of decline. The once promising spikes in app
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  downloads are now flattening and following Musk's takeover, the
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  average time spent on the app has remained stagnant at 19.1
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  minutes per day. The same as in April of 2022,
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  according to Apptopia. And they say there was a pretty
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  nice increase in usage right after he took over.
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  But now it's flat to down, observes Tom Grant, head of
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  research for Apptopia. And the platform saw brief
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  periods of increased engagement, particularly around the collapse
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  of Silicon Valley Bank, an event that caused the surge among
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  Twitter's power users. However, these instances were
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  not sufficient to reverse the overall trend, now
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  comparatively. Other social media apps like
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  TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook record significantly higher
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  daily usage times. Users spend an average of 87
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  minutes per day on TikTok, 43 minutes on Instagram, and 39
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  minutes on Facebook, dwarfing Twitter's average of 26 minutes
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  per day, as found by Sensor Tower.
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  Now, Twitter barely edged out Snapchat.
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  Which sees 25 minutes of daily usage in the US and this stark
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  contrast outlines the gravity of Twitter's challenges and
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  maintaining user engagement. Notably, both younger and older
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  users divided between millennials and Gen.
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  X and older initially increased their time spent on Twitter,
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  according to data around the time of Musk's takeover.
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  However, this momentum soon dissipated with both
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  demographics now spending less time on the platform, according
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  to Amtopia's analysis. The more worrying sign lies in
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  the waning engagement of Twitter's power users.
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  In March, events such as the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank
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  led to a peak in platform engagement, with power users
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  logging in for a 138.7 minutes a day, and by April the figure
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  fell to 138 minutes, slightly less than the same period a year
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  ago globally, Twitter's user rank.
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  Among all apps has stagnated at 7th place since January of 2022,
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  according to data dot A I. And App downloads, what's a
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  promising metric, also showed sign of stagnation.
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  In April, downloads fell to 16.2 million, down from 17.5 million
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  in April of 2022. Slight fluctuations have
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  occurred. For instance, in March Twitter
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  dipped to the 8th place for global download ranks, only to
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  recover in April and despite these statistics.
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  There is a glimmer of hope. The introduction of in app
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  purchases under Musk stewardship has shown promising growth.
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  In April and May of 2022, in app revenue for Twitter totaled just
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  over $120,000 combined. Fast forward to the same period
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  in 2023, the revenue surged to just over $3,000,000 and most of
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  this revenue was driven by users purchasing Twitter Blue
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  subscriptions, which offers users.
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  Verified status for $11.00 per month for iOS and $8 per month
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  for everyone else. Even though this growth in app
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  revenue shows potential, the bigger picture remains
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  unsettled. Since Musk's takeover, there
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  have been 88.1 million downloads of the app, slightly less than
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  the same period a year ago when 88.6 million people downloaded
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  the app. Now this data paints A
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  challenging picture for Twitter under Musk's management.
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  From once being a thriving social media platform, Twitter
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  now grapples with declining user engagement, flattened app
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  downloads and revenue that, despite some signs of life, is
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  far from robust. In the spotlights.
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  Now on Elon Musk, and he has to demonstrate his knack for
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  innovation and revitalization to turn around the fortunes of this
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  once vibrant platform. His task is huge, and we'll see
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  how this saga unfolds in the future.
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  I want to say thank you for listening to the Elon Musk
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  podcast today. I appreciate your time.
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  I appreciate you spending it here with me today.
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  Now if you could take a second and hit the subscribe or follow
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  button on whatever podcast platform that you're listening
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  on right now, that would be fantastic.
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  I do appreciate you and I hope you have a great day.
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  Please take care of each other and yourselves and I'll see you
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  next time.