Elon Musk countersues Twitter

Elon Musk has countersued Twitter, the social network that he previously agreed to buy for $44bn, according to a new report.

He later backed away from the deal, prompting a lawsuit from the company.

Mr Musk’s lawsuit was filed on Friday and has not been made public, CNBC reported. It remains unclear why Mr Musk requested that the details of the suit be kept secret.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO has heavily criticized Twitter in interviews as well as on social media following the sale agreement.

The $44bn deal was announced on 25 April, but a market decline soon led to a plunge in tech stocks, impacting both Tesla and Twitter.

Not long after the deal was agreed upon, Mr Musk said Twitter had provided inaccurate estimates of the numbers of spam and bot accounts on the platform and he also accused the company of not giving him access to information concerning how these accounts were managed.

Earlier in July, Mr Musk said he wanted to end the deal, prompting Twitter to sue him in the Delaware Court of Chancery to force him to go ahead with the agreement.

Mr Musk’s lawyers filed the countersuit in a court in Delaware on Friday. The lawsuit could be made public soon, possibly with some details redacted, according to CNBC.

Chancellor Kathaleen St J McCormick, the judge in the case, issued an order on Thursday evening, outlining a schedule for a trial lasting five days to begin on 17 October.