Yeah, the consensus was definitely not Musk gets out of it. There were a few people that thought that, but it was the minority.
edit: I undeleted since there was a reply, rather than just a new post. I read the second poll wrong - thought it was more than $25 billion. I was surprised that the first poll was split with about 40% on him being able to back out of it (which I’d put as the buys as lower price/settle for less than a billion). I thought consensus was more Musk was screwed with Delaware judges that don’t fuck around, and so would have to pay a bunch of money to go away (which I would not say is being able to back out).
That might not have been enough, but I bet board would have taken $10 billion. Board/management get to keep their jobs and then likely could justify paying themselves a nice big bonus from that free Musk money.
But the point is forcing the transaction through was way better for twitter shareholders than getting a billion or even several billion. So Bobman can say it was a settlement but if the settlement is basically one side gets exactly what they’re asking for and the other side gets nothing extra, then it’s a capitulation.
It’s like resigning a chess match where the outcome is not in doubt but 10 moves away. It’s not like the losing player should then say “I didn’t lose, we agreed to end the match with a settlement”
I doubt Elon the narcissist would want to give money and get nothing in return…that makes him look really bad in his eyes. He’d rather pay $10 for a $1 asset than $3 as a penalty.
The other thing you’re missing is that if he walked away and paid x billion, he’d have to pay the entire amount. If he buys Twitter, the losses are likely higher but it’s shared by all the other investors.
