832
submitted 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) by Beep@lemmus.org to c/technology@lemmy.world

A jury has found Elon Musk liable for misleading investors by deliberately driving down Twitter's stock price in the tumultuous months leading up to his 2022 acquisition of the social media company for $44 billion. But it absolved him of some fraud allegations, finding that he did not "scheme" to mislead investors.

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top new old
[-] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 23 points 2 days ago

That's it, again?

JAIL TIME!

If I steal a bread to feed my hungry children I'll go to jail, but this guy ficks around with billions and all he gets is a tiny slap on his fingers?

[-] brownsugga@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago

Oh No, point 2 % of his net worth

0.2%

literally less than a traffic ticket in terms of scale

[-] sunbeam60@feddit.uk 7 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I mean I dislike the guy as much as you, but almost all of his “wealth” is paper wealth. He may very well not be able to liquidate 2% of his wealth (fine with me).

[-] iglou@programming.dev 15 points 2 days ago

He doesn't have to liquidate shit, none of them do. They borrow against their holdings.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 6 points 2 days ago

Point is that if I commit fraud or steal anything over 10 dollars I might go to jail

This guy lies steals and cheats by the billions and he gets a hug

Jail the motherfucker already

[-] brownsugga@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago

0.2% not 2%

[-] SCmSTR@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 2 days ago

Reminds me of the same defense some people make in divorce court

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] drislands@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

...is Musk worth a trillion dollars now?

I mean, financially, yeah I think so. Which is ironic, since as a person he's worth about as much as a large turd in a small bag.

[-] Triumph@fedia.io 257 points 4 days ago

If the punishment is a fine, it's only illegal for poor people.

The only war is class war.

[-] cannedtuna@lemmy.world 115 points 4 days ago

Considering he’s made $400B since acquiring Twitter, this was just a minor cost of doing business.

[-] kautau@lemmy.world 57 points 4 days ago
[-] bobs_monkey@lemmy.zip 10 points 4 days ago

Best find a different ATM.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 7 points 3 days ago

I don't know, 0.5% isn't a bad rate...

load more comments (4 replies)
[-] oyo@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 days ago

And there is almost zero chance he actually pays this. If anything, it will be a fraction of the amount in 20 years after he exhausts appeals and pushes deadlines to the max.

[-] LedgeDrop@lemmy.zip 15 points 4 days ago

Considering he’s made $400B since acquiring Twitter...

Serious question: How?

AFAIK, Twitter wasn't terribly profitable before they sold to Musk. Then after he purchased it, the enshittification accelerated.

How on earth does this result in $400 Billions in profit?!?

[-] halcyoncmdr@piefed.social 28 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

He made $400B, not Twitter. That's almost entirely from Tesla and other ventures, not Twitter.

Last I've been able to find Twitter was valued at $33B when xAI bought it. But that was clearly an overvalued sale. Just look at the valuation over time.

And that's just raw valuation which is easily manipulated, not revenue or profit, which can be easily manipulated.

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (7 replies)
load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (19 replies)
[-] mechoman444@lemmy.world 59 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I don't understand why these courts charge a set fine for stuff like this. This is clearly an extremely unique case. The man is 20% shy of being a trillionaire.

What really needs to be done is they need to charge a percentage of his profits. Say 20 to 30%.

[-] ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one 2 points 2 days ago

This idea needs to be fine tuned. The problem is that parasitic oligarchs don’t have a real income.

For those who don’t know, the parasite oligarchs take the vast amount of stock that they own and take it to a bank. The bank gives the parasite a loan with the stock as collateral. Right off the vat, the parasite gets to claim debt on their taxes. The parasite will then take the loan and use it to buy more stock or companies or anything that generates more wealth.

Loan gets paid off with the generated wealth. Due to generous tax loop holes put into place by politicians). The parasite gets to claim that they didn’t make any money and get a tax bill of zero and sometimes a refund.

[-] mechoman444@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago

This scheme is called “buy, borrow, die.” It’s legal. The stocks are typically not sold off, so capital gains taxes are avoided. Loans and debt are not taxable. It’s effectively profit with relatively low risk. The point is that the level of entry is extremely high. One must already have large amounts of money to qualify for these kinds of loans.

The problem, of course, is that if you start taxing debt, like people taking out loans, it’s not just going to be millionaires, as you called them “parasites,” paying those taxes. It will be everybody taking out a loan, including the poor and the middle class.

The proposed solution is to tax people based on net worth. If you’re worth above a certain amount, then you get taxed at a very high percentage.

With that being said, if that were the case and Elon Musk were taxed like this, he would only pay around $12–$13 billion out of the roughly $800 billion he already has. In essence, it would still be pocket change to him.

At this point, wealthy people not paying taxes has become a kind of game, who can pay the least.

[-] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 days ago

What really needs to be done is they need to charge a percentage of his profits. Say 20 to 30%.

Lol. That's not how the state serves capitalism. Fixed fines!!! Gotta put the burden the poor every time.

[-] Quill7513@slrpnk.net 7 points 3 days ago

Antonin Scalea capped punative damages

load more comments (3 replies)
[-] melsaskca@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 days ago

Money no longer talks. You need hard time for these societal meddlers.

[-] MrSulu@lemmy.ml 76 points 4 days ago

For the rest of us, there would be a seizure of assets and a prison term.

load more comments (2 replies)
[-] Mulligrubs@lemmy.world 107 points 4 days ago

So that's like me paying a $20 fine. GOOD JOB

[-] frongt@lemmy.zip 53 points 4 days ago

Except he almost certainly won't be paying anywhere near that amount, if anything.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] quarkquasar@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago

He must pay a pittance, to be paid in 20 equal installments of one-twentieth of a pittance each.

[-] anotherspinelessdem@lemmy.ml 18 points 3 days ago

Cool, so when this reaches Appeals court (which is where it's absolutely going next because they'll definitely appeal it), that 2.1B$ fine will get knocked down to 10$ and a blowjob (for Elon).

But hey, the Washington Post or whatever can get a nice little headline out of it where they pretend billionaires face any sort of punishment in this Capitalist hellscape for 5 seconds so that's nice.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world 17 points 3 days ago

Drop in a bucket. He should be fined of the money he paid to buy Twitter.

[-] CovfefeKills@lemmy.world 30 points 3 days ago

That is the price of new phone for him compared to us...

[-] WanderWisley@lemmy.world 46 points 4 days ago

Spoiler alert: he won’t pay or admit any wrongdoing.

[-] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 20 points 4 days ago

admit any wrongdoing.

So, the Trump school of leadership.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] Insekticus@aussie.zone 52 points 4 days ago

That's a fine of $2 out of a total of $800.

I'd speed past cameras if I was running late, and that was the fine.

[-] rogsson@piefed.social 30 points 3 days ago

It should be % based of his income. Otherwise it’s not a punishment 

[-] yabbadabaddon@lemmy.zip 16 points 3 days ago

This does not work because he will find a way to have 0 income (legally). I don't know how we can make the billionaires pay, but we should tax the assets not the incomes.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Is this your first time in capitalism? That's how every fine works. There are no punishments for the privileged.

The president is a pedophile who has been prosecuted for like 30 felonies. They're not fining the creep at all. That's reality.

load more comments (3 replies)
[-] GreenBeanMachine@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)
[-] Etterra@discuss.online 14 points 3 days ago

That's assuming they can even get him to pay it.

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[-] stephen@lazysoci.al 38 points 4 days ago

I wish “massive white color crime” for the expediency that a “Black dude swelling a bit of weed” got.

load more comments (2 replies)
[-] minorkeys@lemmy.world 28 points 4 days ago

He's made billions more after and because of it so he doesn't give a shit about a meaningless, billion dollar fine.

[-] blady_blah@lemmy.world 13 points 4 days ago

It's an ego thing, he'll hire a bunch of really expensive lawyers and drag it out as long as he can. This is what the rich do.

load more comments (3 replies)
[-] 1984@lemmy.today 17 points 3 days ago

So the public paid to see another billionaire do things nobody else can do and get away with it. Nice.

[-] 13igTyme@piefed.social 14 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I wasn't invested in Twitter, but when I heard he was trying to get out of it I bought some stock. I knew he couldn't get out of the deal because it doesn't work like that and he's a dumb ass.

My only regret was not buying more. Thanks for the money, idiot.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] SethTaylor@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago

He'll have it back in a month...

[-] jontree255@lemmy.world 12 points 4 days ago
  1. That’s chump change to him.
  2. He’s not going to pay it anyway.
load more comments (1 replies)
[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 7 points 3 days ago

They should repossess it and place it in the hands of a responsible steward...

load more comments
view more: next ›
this post was submitted on 21 Mar 2026
832 points (98.9% liked)

Technology

83027 readers
3534 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS