Elon Musk offers Twitter staff stock grants at $20 billion value

Elon Musk has offered his Twitter employees stock awards based on a $20 billion valuation – less than half the $44 billion price he paid for it.

In a note to staff, the billionaire expressed optimism about the social-media company’s future.

He said: “I see a clear, but difficult, path to a >$250B valuation” and suggested stock issued now would be worth 10 times more.

Musk said Twitter is changing so quickly that it “can be thought of as an inverse startup.”

He stressed to staff drastic changes were required to keep Twitter from going bankrupt.

Since Musk took over, several big advertisers have pulled their spending on the platform, which has proved a major threat to its major revenue source.

Twitter said in court filings that parts of its source code were exposed online, raising security concerns for the company.

In a Friday, March 24 email, Twitter said it is giving new equity grants to staff, that will start to vest after six months.

The firm also intends to have a liquidity event in about a year, during which employees can cash out part of their equity.

The number of employees who got equity awards was not disclosed.

Employees have had many questions about compensation since Mr. Musk’s turbulent takeover of Twitter last year.

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Ex-employees said Twitter generally provided stock grants, which vested over several years, as part of the compensation.

In an email to employees in February, Mr. Musk said that Twitter would issue “very significant stock and other compensation awards, based on performance.”

He informed staff in November that Twitter will continue to offer stock and that the plan would be comparable to what SpaceX provides.

He added: “Exceptional amounts of stock will be awarded for exceptional performance.”

Source: The Wall Street Journal

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