- Elon Musk tweeted Friday morning his proposed acquisition of Twitter is "on hold."
- The deal is on hold pending verification of a detail from a filing that said less than 5% of Twitter accounts are spam or fake, Musk said.
- Musk has said tackling spam accounts would be a priority if he took over Twitter.
Elon Musk tweeted early Friday morning to say that his proposed $44 billion acquisition of Twitter is "temporarily on hold."
Musk included a ten-day old Reuters article in his tweet, which reported that Twitter had said in a regulatory filing that fake or spam accounts represented less than 5% of its user base.
"Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users," Musk tweeted.
It's not clear from Musk's tweet what part of the report concerns him or why it would result in him putting the deal on hold. Musk recently secured an extra $7 billion in backing for the deal.
Musk has stated publicly that tackling spam bots on Twitter would be one of his priorities if he successfully acquires the company.
Musk's tweet sent Twitter stock tumbling as much as 25% in premarket trading.
Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in a note sent to Insider: "Many will view this as Musk using this Twitter filing/spam accounts as a way to get out of this deal in a vastly changing market."
Ives said the fact Musk revealed he was putting the deal on hold with a tweet rather than a regulatory filing was "troubling" and had the effect of turning the Twitter deal into a "circus show."
Twitter did not immediately respond to the news when contacted by Insider.
This is a developing story...