Elon Musk's $44 billion buyout of Twitter has been approved by a majority of Twitter stockholders, according to a Reuters report.
The vote takes place in the midst of a court dispute between Musk and Twitter, which the billionaire entrepreneur offered to acquire earlier this year but has since informed Twitter that the arrangement is no longer in effect.
Shareholders have until 10 a.m. PT on Tuesday to vote, but early tallying of the vote on Monday indicated that shareholder approval of the merger was certain, according to persons familiar with the count. The board of directors of the corporation had encouraged shareholders to approve the transaction.
According to Musk, Twitter misled him about the volume of spam or fake accounts on the service and broke the terms of the merger deal by keeping a $7 million settlement with the company's former security chief, Peiter Zatko, a secret.
In response, Twitter filed a lawsuit in July to enforce the terms of the merger agreement against Musk. Twitter claimed that the billionaire was attempting to back out of the deal since his personal wealth had decreased and the cost of the acquisition had gone up.
In order to finish his multi-billion dollar acquisition of the social networking platform, the business sued Musk in July in the Delaware Court of Chancery. The trial between Twitter and Musk is set to begin on Oct. 17.
Musk's legal team wrote a letter to Twitter on Friday, claiming yet another reason to cancel the potential transaction. Musk's team claimed that Twitter's multimillion-dollar payout to whistleblower Zatko violated the terms of the agreement.
Last month, Zatko accused Twitter of "extreme, egregious deficiencies" in privacy, security, and content moderation.
Musk's legal team claimed in Friday's letter that a purported $7.75 million severance payment from Twitter to Zatko is another infringement of the takeover agreement.
Twitter stated that it has not violated any of its obligations.
"As was the case with both your July 8, 2022 and August 29, 2022 purported notices of termination, the purported termination set forth in your September 9, 2022 letter is invalid and wrongful under the Agreement," the social media giant's legal team wrote to Musk's representatives.
"Twitter has breached none of its representations or obligations under the Agreement, and following the receipt of the approval of Twitter's stockholders at its Sept. 13, 2022 special meeting, all of the conditions precedent to the closing of the Merger will be satisfied."
The Twitter-Musk issue has grown extremely convoluted. In April, Musk first suggested buying the company. After some pushback, Twitter accepted the agreement.
