US SEC Sues Elon Musk for Securities Violation Over Twitter Acquisition

The U.S. SEC has sued Elon Musk over failing to file a timely beneficial ownership report regarding his Twitter acquisition. Musk allegedly underpaid by $150 million due to this delay. His attorney has dismissed the lawsuit as a baseless attack. This follows previous legal actions, including a fine for his 2018 tweet about taking Tesla private.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed a lawsuit against Elon Musk, accusing him of violating securities laws during his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter (now X). The complaint alleges that Musk failed to file a timely beneficial ownership report, which discloses the purchase of more than 5% of a company’s shares.

Musk began acquiring Twitter shares in early 2022, reaching the 5% ownership threshold by March of that year. However, he did not file the required report until April 4, 2022, 11 days after the deadline. According to the SEC, this delay allowed Musk to continue buying shares at artificially low prices, resulting in an underpayment of at least $150 million.

Musk's attorney, Alex Spiro, strongly denied the allegations, arguing that the SEC's complaint was baseless. He labeled the lawsuit a "sham" and stated that it was a result of an ongoing "campaign of harassment" against Musk. Spiro further emphasized that the alleged failure to file the form would carry only a nominal penalty if proven true.

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This is not the first legal action the SEC has taken against Musk. In 2018, Musk was sued by the SEC over a controversial tweet where he claimed to have "funding secured" to take Tesla private. Both Musk and Tesla were fined $20 million for that incident.