(Reuters) – Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk’s purchase of a 9% stake in Twitter earlier this month is under investigation by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), The Information website reported on Thursday. .
The FTC is investigating whether Musk complied with an antitrust requirement when he told the site, citing people familiar with the matter. Companies that fail to comply with the rules on reporting significant stock purchases can be fined up to $43,792 a day.
After an initial buyout, Musk offered to buy the company for $54.20 a share in cash, which Twitter agreed to this week.
There is little expectation that Musk’s potential purchase of Twitter will be rejected by antitrust authorities.
The focus of the FTC investigation is whether Musk bought the stake to influence Twitter’s management or whether he appeared to be a passive shareholder, according to the report.
In a document sent April 4 to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Musk characterized his participation as passive.
Twitter said it had no comment on the report, while the FTC declined to comment.
(Reporting by Akash Sriram and Diane Bartz)
