Elon Musk deal for Twitter dodges lengthy US antitrust review

Twitter Inc said on Friday that the US antitrust waiting period for its $44 billion acquisition of the social media giant by Elon Musk had ended, indicating it had dodged a lengthy review of the proposed deal.

With the termination, completion of the deal is now subject to the remaining customary closing terms, including approval by Twitter stockholders and any other regulatory approvals, Twitter said.

Under antitrust law, deals are reported to the US government for review by the Justice Department or the Federal Trade Commission. If either agency had filed a “second request” for documents, the deal would have faced an investigation that could last months.

However, last month Tesla Inc chief executive Musk said the Twitter deal was “temporarily on hold” while he asked for more details about the proportion of fake accounts on the platform.

Musk has secured equity and debt funding for the deal.

In morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange, Twitter was up nearly half a percent at $40.10 per share.