Elon Musk and Tesla were found not guilty Friday by a San Francisco federal court jury in a securities fraud trial in a class-action lawsuit that stemmed from a tweet Musk made in 2018.
of TeslaThe CEO of SpaceX and Twitter was sued by Tesla shareholders over a series of tweets he wrote in August 2018. He “secured funding” to take the automaker private for $420 a share. said..”
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After his tweet, Tesla’s trading was halted and its stock price remained volatile for weeks.
The jury deliberated for less than two hours before reading the verdict. Nicholas Porritt, his partner at Levi & Korsinsky, a firm that represents shareholders in class action lawsuits, said in an email to CNBC:
“I am deeply grateful for the unanimous conclusion of the jury,” Musk said. wrote on twitter.
Musk’s lead attorney, Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan’s Alex Spiro, said before a jury on Friday that the matter would have to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, and that Tesla’s CEO would take the company private. He said fraud cannot be built on consideration.
Spiro did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Qualified class action shareholders include a mix of stock and options buyers who allege Musk’s tweets are reckless and false and rely on his statements to determine when to buy or sell. was
Musk later claimed he had verbal promises from a Saudi sovereign wealth fund that he believed the funding would occur at the proposed price based on the handshake. However, the deal never materialized.
During the course of the trial, Musk also said he sold shares in SpaceX and raised funds from the Saudi Public Investment Fund to fund Tesla’s take-private deal.
