Closing summary
The German and French stock markets are pushing higher, trading up 1.2% and 1.7% respectively, while the UK’s FTSE MiB is lagging for a second day. It’s edged 0.1% higher to 7,635, dragged down by mining shares after disappointing results. Italy’s FTSE MiB is flat.
On Wall Street, the Nasdaq advanced 1%, boosted by a 9% rise in the Tesla share price after bumper profits.
Oil prices have risen about 2%, with Brent crude trading at $108.92 a barrel.
Our main stories today:
Over here, THG shares jumped 18% to 112p after the company said it had received “numerous” takeover offers and rejected them as “unacceptable”.
Thank you for reading. We’ll be back tomorrow. take care! – JK
Elon Musk secures $46.5bn to buy Twitter
Elon Musk has lined up $46.5bn in financing to buy Twitter, and is trying to negotiate an agreement with the company, according to regulatory filings.
Last week, the Tesla boss launched an audacious bid to buy Twitter for $54.20 a share, valuing the company at $43.4bn (£33bn). He said he wants to release its “extraordinary potential” to boost free speech and democracy across the world.
According to documents filed with US securities regulators, Musk is exploring what’s known as a tender offer to buy all of the social media platform’s common stock for $54.20 per share in cash.
Under a tender offer Musk, who already owns about 9% of Twitter shares, would take his offer directly to other shareholders, bypassing the board. (The entrepreneur hasn’t decided yet whether to do that.) Twitter has not responded to Musk’s proposal, according to the filings.
Last week Twitter’s board adopted a “poison pill” defence that could make a takeover attempt prohibitively expensive. It announced a limited-duration shareholder rights plan that could thwart the billionaire’s attempts to take over the company.
The filing states that “entities related to [Musk] have received commitment letters committing to provide an aggregate of approximately $46.5bn.”
