Billionaire Mark Cuban predicted on Friday that Elon Musk will "make a killing" by owning Twitter after finalizing his $44 billion acquisition deal.
Cuban was responding to a comment on Twitter by Yale professor Howard Forman, who said that Musk "grossly overpaid" for the social media platform.
"He starts out having grossly overpaid for this opportunity. Can't imagine any of the sharks doing this or believing this is a good start," Forman said in response to Cuban's tweet about Musk in which he praised his fellow billionaire and said that he is looking forward to his "era on Twitter."
Cuban told Forman that Twitter is "a unique asset that he will be able to take public the next time there is an insane bull market. He just needs to grow it profitably and he will make a killing."
Twitter came under Musk's ownership on Thursday night, hours before the Friday deadline. He now controls the company after spending months trying to back out of the deal.
"The bird is freed," Musk tweeted late Thursday.
Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal and General Counsel Vijaya Gadde were reportedly fired after Musk sealed the deal. More personnel and operational changes in the company are expected in the coming weeks.
Earlier on Friday, Cuban expressed his optimism about the deal, tweeting: "I'm looking forward to the @elonmusk era on Twitter. He is a ready, fire, aim entrepreneur....The only expectation you can have of @elonmusk is that he will flex his independence to show everyone who's in charge."
On Thursday, Musk wrote a letter to advertisers that he posted on his Twitter account in which he explained why he bought the company. Musk spoke about promoting a "digital town square" where various beliefs can be expressed within limitations.
"The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner without resorting to violence," he wrote.
Other TV personalities and celebrities shared their enthusiasm, with NBA legend Shaquille O'Neal congratulating Musk and said that he is "excited" to see what the Tesla CEO will accomplish.
Senator Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, was also excited about the news, calling the purchase "the most significant developments for free speech in modern times."
"Big tech is the single greatest threat to free speech in the free and fair elections that we have in America and Twitter was brazen about it, silencing and censoring conservatives," he told Fox News.
Edward Snowden wrote on Twitter on Friday: "This is going to cause controversy, but platform censorship had clearly gone too far. Content moderation should be an individual decision, not a corporate prison. Let people make their own choices—and not just on Twitter." He was retweeting a news report that suggested Musk would reverse lifetime bans on Twitter users."
U.S. authorities have been after Snowden since he leaked highly classified National Security Agency secrets in 2013 that revealed information about global surveillance programs. The American whistleblower, who was granted Russian citizenship last month, faces espionage charges in the U.S., where he could face up to 30 years in jail if convicted.
Newsweek reached out to Tesla for comment.
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