US jury finds Elon Musk misled investors during Twitter purchase

The verdict delivered on Friday in the class action securities lawsuit means the world’s richest person could be ordered to pay billions of dollars, according to damages calculated by jurors.

But the nine-person jury absolved Musk of some fraud allegations, finding that he did not “scheme” to mislead investors.

Minutes after the judgement was announced, lawyers for Musk, who acquired the social media platform in late October 2022 and later renamed it X, said their client will appeal the decision, characterising it as a “setback”.

Musk, who has a near-constant presence on X, did not immediately react to the verdict, which marks a rare legal defeat for the billionaire often dubbed “Teflon Elon” for his ability to emerge unscathed from lawsuits he is expected to lose.

In 2023, a jury in the same San Francisco federal court cleared him within hours of similar charges brought by Tesla shareholders, following his 2018 tweets claiming he had the funding to take the automaker private.

Forbes magazine earlier this month estimated Elon Musk’s net worth at $839bn, a figure based primarily on his stakes in his portfolio of companies including Tesla and SpaceX.