Twitter Takeover, And How Elon Musk Becomes The First Person In Modern History To Have Lost $200 Billion

Rich entrepreneurs tend to distant themselves from the rest of the public. Not only because of their wealth that made them that way, but also because of their status as important figures.

Many of them don't even use social media that often.

To most wealthy people that are leaders in their respective industries, social media is only about getting up to date about social news and what's going on, and little about anything else. To many of those people, who can be either industrialists, business magnates, or innovators, social media serves no other purpose than that, besides mostly about entertainment.

These people may consider social media as something for the lazy, unmotivated, unsuccessful, and foolish people who don’t have anything to do other than liking and commenting on others.

But Elon Musk is very different person than most people.

The billionaire has tried many efforts to distinguish himself from every other executive.

But that apparently, doesn't translate well to his net worth.

For most of his time as a businessman, Elon Musk sets his own standards for public remarks.

His love with Twitter, even 'forced' him to acquire it.

Musk described Twitter as a "plane that is headed towards the ground at high speed with the engines on fire and the controls don't work."

Many have said that the $44 billion acquisition of Twitter is too expensive. But what happened was that, he made the purchase when Tesla shares, which is Musk's main source of net worth, tanked. And when Musk tried to get out of the Twitter deal, citing Twitter's bot issues among others, he failed.

He was forced to borrow lots of money, and had no choice other than becoming the sole leader of what he claimed was a loss-making company.

Musk doesn't have the slightest idea of how to make Twitter work, even though he is one of the most followed people on the platform.

But regardless, the eccentric billionaire has said that the one reason he bought Twitter was to remake it into the center of free speech.

Musk said that he wanted to take over Twitter, and promised a "de facto public town square" that would amplify free speech as one of the key principles of democracy.

After all, Musk describes himself as a free-speech absolutist.

While many people love him, many despise him.

Among those who started hating him, considered the billionaire to have an impulse control of a toddler. Many also considered Musk the biggest internet troll ever.

Prominent people like Musk's fellow billionaire Mark Cuban, started demanding more transparency about what is or is not free speech.

"In reality, there is only one person that decides and he decides who is naughty or nice." Cuban criticized Musk.

Biz Stone, co-founder of Twitter, also criticized Musk by saying that he is "not a serious person" and that he "does things for sport."

Most criticisms do not bother Musk. After all, Musk certainly neglected (or didn't read) much of the critics.

However, he did responded to some, and among those he responded, the billionaire has been seen insulting the critics back with languages that could cost any CEO in the world their job.

Back in 2018, Musk called Vernon Unsworth a "pedo guy" on Twitter, when the latter attempted to rescue children trapped in a cave in Thailand.

That happened after the British diver accused him of "a publicity stunt" by sending a miniature submarine to help extract the Thai schoolboys.

The billionaire then successfully defended himself against a defamation lawsuit Unsworth brought against him in Los Angeles.

And later, Musk has used another vulgarism in tweeting at Bill Gates, the co-founder of Microsoft.

"In case u need to lose a boner fast," Musk wrote at the time.

Elon Musk, egomaniac in charge of Twitter, was the second person ever to amass a personal fortune of more than $200 billion, breaching that threshold in January 2021, months after Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

Musk's net worth peaked at an eyewatering $340 billion in November 2021, and that he remained the world's richest person until LVMH owner Bernard Arnault overtook him.

After weeks of chaos and controversies, exodus on Twitter from both users and advertisers, mass firing and resignation, Elon Musk's credibility is questioned.

After the reinstatement of the Twitter account of former U.S. President Donald Trump and rapper Kanye West, Musk has been active on Twitter much to the amusement of account holders and media alike.

And following the continued fall of Tesla's share, Musk's wealth continues to drop.

That until he became the only person in modern history to have lost $200 billion.

To put it into another perspective, that amount is equivalent to the annual GDP of Greece.

That amount is what Russian President Vladimir Putin is expecting to see in a few years between Russian-Chinese bilateral trade. That amount if also the money South Korea has been spending when it tries to boost the population over the span of 16 years.

Famous brands like McDonald's, Nike, Shell, IBM, Caterpillar, HSBC, Qualcomm, Adobe, Philip Morris, Walt Disney, and Toyota are billions of dollars 'cheaper'.

That amount is also more than BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Audi, combined.

In another perspective, it took Bill Gates more than two decades to reach $100 billion in net worth, which is half of that amount.

Elon Musk on the other hand, lost that in just one year.

Guinness World Records also acknowledged this, and has made an entry for it.

According to a number of Tesla individual investors, Musk's acquisition of Twitter is a major reason for Tesla's stock market.

With the results of Tesla's collapse and the controversy that he made following his acquisition on Twitter, Musk is urged to find someone to take over the social network so he can concentrate, and focus on his other businesses and try to recover what he has lost.

For years, Musk was seen as an eccentric but brilliant innovator who disrupts industries, challenging the status quo and changing the world. At times, he can be entertaining, but at other times, Musk is a person who does whatever he likes.

"Don't worry too much about the craziness in the stock market," Musk once said to his staff at Tesla. "As we demonstrate continued excellent performance, the market will recognize that."

Read: A Poll By Elon Musk Finds That The Twitterverse Doesn't Want Him To Be Twitter's CEO