Elon Cleaning House

its similar to if Rupert Murdoch came on the air and told his viewers to vote for repubs. Carries more weight than a op-ed

 

Elon seems to be having fun with this.

 

No, it's not glorification if it's mentioned as the truth... We all saw the riots. We all saw the violence.

 

When I talk about this specific subject it's personal because when I was young we lived in Alexandria Virginia. My uncle, one of 3 to serve in military - he was in the Korean war, he had a coin laundry mat in DC when MLKjr. got assassinated.

I'll cut the the case if you are catch in your business when people are rioting in the streets and burning down building down around you... you need to be able to defend where you are by any means possible.

My uncle survived that riot in his coil laundry mat. That's all I'll say about that part... But we need national laws that are unambiguous in letting business owners that get stuck in their place of business that they have to right to fight back. Talking about it on Twitter is not glorifying it.

 

It is glorification if you are calling for it to happen. Which he was (he was stating that he was going to do it). Which is why the accounts that just copied his statements were all banned at that point. For glorification of violence.

 

I support the right to self defense and reasonable use of force. If your uncle had to beat up or shoot someone, I think that's different than the President using a racially-tinged phrase and suggesting he would get the U.S. military to start shooting "thugs" for looting - another term that has often been racially loaded.

I'd be more willing to give Trump the benefit of the doubt if he hadn't suggested his supporters should beat up hecklers/protesters at his rallies or if he had made a sincere effort to de-escalate the violence on January 6th when it started. Instead, he always bragged about having the toughest, most dangerous guys on his side. He asked the Proud Boys to stand by. He made a "joke" about the "second amendment people" having a solution to Hillary's Supreme Court picks. Maybe he just likes to talk like this because he thinks it makes him look strong. No doubt in my mind though that he considered these sorts of statements to be veiled threats. I do not recall Biden or Obama ever suggesting anyone - much less the U.S. military - should start opening fire on the January 6th rioters or the White Supremacists in Charlottesville. Trump's use of violent rhetoric was not accidental, and it was pervasive.

 

C'mon man, we knew the riots we deadly, and that more were coming.

Regardless... they censored Pubs almost exclusively. Those days are over.

 

Well... to me "thugs" come in ALL COLORS, so I don't ascribe to that thinking. And I don't remember him say that he'd have them shot them all. Again, innocent people we getting murdered by the riotous people. Riots are a whole different animal.

But he is still banned and that may or may not be a good example for anyone to express satisfaction with the way the last group in control of Twitter handled adversity in thinking and personal opinions. Everyone could see that Twitter targeting Pubs, and specifically elected officials from the Republican Party.

 

Well that is false. Again, Trump was allowed to stay on the platform for years, despite the fact that accounts that did nothing but copy his Tweets rarely lasted more than a week before they were banned for glorification of violence or targeted harassment or any of a variety of other rules he regularly broke and that they explicitly stated they were ignoring because he was President.

 

Not surprised at all. Twitter has gotten more media exposure in the past two weeks than they have in forever because of Elon. If they lose George Conway tho…..

 

Relevant story on the “Antifa terror” now out

 

Elon bought the company for $44 billion. Here's the financing - Musk $24 billion in equity, Saudi Arabia (the guys who bone-sawed a critic to finance the purchase of a platform by a guy who wants to give it more free speech is beyond ironic) $5 billion in equity, Larry Ellison $2 billion in equity, and $13 billion in loans from Wall Street banks. The interest payments on the loans are $1 billion a year. However, Twitter has never generated cash flow of more than $770 million.

So here’s the rub… he’s got to find the cash flow someplace. That's why he's lurching around, from the incompetent firings to arguing with Stephen King over whether he'd pay $20 or $8 for a blue checkmark. Complete amateur hour.

Now revenue isn't falling because of "woke activists." It's falling because corporations are worried about the brand value of Twitter. It's more than just trolls increasing the n-bomb 5x over the weekend. Twitter put out an innocuous statement to advertisers that things weren't going to change, then Musk retweets the retarded Paul Pelosi conspiracy theory. Who wants to be associated with a sewer? Musk's behavior has given advertisers little comfort.

Tesla stock has been in a tailspin. Musk partially financed the purchase by selling $7 billion in Tesla stock. So where's the other $17 billion come from? He probably borrowed against equity of his stock. Rather than sell the shares, he pledged shares as collateral for a loan. It makes sense. Selling stock triggers a capital gain, interest payments can be written off against income.

Why does that matter? If Twitter is going to fail, Elon is going to have sell $17 billion worth of stock to cover his personal loan. But he hasn't pledged $17 billion. He's pledged more. Perhaps 2x that amount. Banks require a cushion above the value of the loan. So if he has pledged $34 billion, that amount is declining every day as Tesla falls exposing him to refinancing more of the company.

Elon should have stuck to making electric vehicles and rockets to Mars. It's easier than running a social platform profitably.

 

Seems clear he will suffer a loss. And in the case of other losses for conservative causes, I usually say the individual that took the loss will be fully compensated and then some. But that is a lot more money than we are usually talking about. Republicans in Congress may try to help him. And he will be lauded if he destroys Twitter. That is just art of the mindset. But it feels like he will suffer real financial losses and real reputational damage. Even those that cheered him on like Thiel will be sure they would have handled it better and could have made Twitter profitable

 

Funny and petty

 

This is a nice hit piece whomever you work for put together for you, but it’s pretty dumb. As if all of the financiers didn’t evaluate this information before going in on the deal. The $13 billion in loans from Wall Street banks…I suppose their underwriters just rubber-stamped all those loans without looking at the underlying financials. And of course, Musk doesn’t know what he’s doing. We just have to accept that an already ultra-successful CEO doesn’t understand basic math, because your little Democratic hit piece here says so. Larry Ellison was just looking for $2 billion to burn. He’s never done a business deal before and he can’t possibly grasp basic math and financials. We just need to accept the DNC’s opinion here that there’s no way this will work out for Musk, because they have much better underwriters than Wall Street banks and billionaire CEOs. And let’s not forget the DNC have the best business minds in the world too. By god, if they can’t make it work on paper, the richest CEO in the world can’t either!!

 

All the subsidizing he got for Tesla from the Govrmnt aint coming for Twitter. He will need to do everything with his own money. It will be interesting to see what his plans are and if they work.

 

The Wall Street loans are for sure secured by Tesla stock. Heads they win, tails, they don't lose. Not sure about whether he has any personal debt in addition to those, but he is factually spot on for the Wall Street loans. No way do they loan somebody that type of money to pay that sort of premium on a company that doesn't make money without securing it with an asset of actual value.

 

I think it's possible (not saying it's probable) that Musk sees this as a toy and doesn't care that much if he loses some money. I'm not sure what the Saudis are thinking about it though. Maybe they think they can get some say in the moderation as it relates to issues they care about, such as them murdering journalists.

 

That the loans are secured by Tesla stock wouldn’t change anything about what I said. A house is probably about the safest asset you own, but if you go to take out a mortgage or home equity line, the banks are going to underwrite that loan to the core. It being secured by your home doesn’t result in an automatic approval for your loan. Since TSLA stock isn’t a guaranteed value (as we have already seen this year), the situation is even more tenuous with underwriting. You act as if offering up collateral for a $13 billion loan wouldn’t be audited by underwriters to the hilt. Get real. You obviously have zero clue what you’re talking about.