Elon Musk Revives $44 Billion Deal To Buy Twitter, Aims To Avoid Legal Battle

In a surprise move, tech billionaire Elon Musk has decided to go ahead with the Twitter buyout after months of trying to get out of the deal.

Musk revived the original bid to buy Twitter at $54.20 a share, at a market valuation of around $44 billion, in a bid to avoid a legal battle.

In a letter to Twitter on Tuesday (3 October), Musk made the proposal to revive the original bid, according to a security exchange filing.

The Tesla CEO said that he intended to proceed to closing of the Twitter buyout provided, a stay and ajournment of trial in the court case filed by Twitter against Musk after he abruptly terminated the deal earlier this year.

Twitter said it received the letter and intends to close the deal at the agreed-upon price, without commenting specifically on how it will respond to Musk, reports Bloomberg.

Musk had been trying for months to end his contract to acquire Twitter, signed in April.

The tech billionaire formally quit the deal in July and Twitter sued him in Delaware Chancery Court to force him to go forward with the purchase.

In a tweet on Wednesday, Musk said that buying Twitter is "an accelerant to creating X, the everything app".