Elon Musk’s successful bid to buy Twitter for $54.20 a share on Monday puts the Tesla founder firmly in control of the social media platform, which represents a major change in who calls the shots. He will become the first private owner of the company in a long time.
By Vance Cariaga
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Because Twitter is a publicly traded company — until Musk officially takes it private — it’s not currently “owned” by any single person or entity. The largest shareholder is Vanguard Group, which recently upped its stake in the social media platform to push Musk out of the top spot, the Wall Street Journal reported.
On April 8, Vanguard disclosed that it owns 82.4 million shares of Twitter, or 10.3% of the company. Before that, Musk had been the top shareholder with a 9.1% stake after increasing his position earlier in the month.
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About 80% of Twitter shares are owned by institutions such as private companies and investment funds, the U.S. Sun reported. In addition to Vanguard, other top institutional investors include Morgan Stanley Investment Management and BlackRock Fund Advisors.
Among individual investors, Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey is among the top shareholders, with just more than 18 million shares and a 2.4% stake, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Dorsey currently serves as CEO of Block (formerly Square), a digital payment system. Twitter’s current CEO is Parag Agrawal.
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Before Twitter went public in 2013, its three largest stakeholders were Dorsey, fellow co-founder Evan Williams, and Peter Fenton, an early investor in the company.
