Twitter: Has Elon Musk bought it, how much has he paid, who owned Twitter before, what has Elon Musk said about future of Twitter, could Donald Trump return and is Elon Musk the richest man in the world?

The South African-born entrepreneur will pay £34.5bn.

It comes after the billionaire had bought up a 9 per cent stake in the company and looked set to join its board, before shifting to a takeover bid, saying he wanted to ‘unlock the potential’ of the site.

But what has he said about the future of Twitter and who is he buying it from?

Here’s all you need to know:

Is Elon Musk buying Twitter?

It was announced on Monday that the Twitter board had accepted a bid to buy the company from SpaceX and Tesla owner Elon Musk.

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How much is he paying?

Elon Musk will pay 54.20 US dollars (£42.20) per share – about 44 billion dollars (£34.5 billion) – to purchase Twitter.

Is Elon Musk the richest man in the world?

According to Forbes annual list of billionaires for 2022, Elon Musk is the world’s richest man – worth $219bn.

He overtook Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and saw his wealth increase by $68bn compared to 2021.

Who previously owned Twitter?

Twitter was founded by Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Biz Stone and Evan Williams in 2006.

During the 16 years since that founding, it has become a publicly listed company with a wide number of shareholders.

According to Wall Street Journal, the group with the highest stake in Twitter prior to Musk’s buyout was the Vanguard Group – owning 10.3 per cent of the company.

Elon Musk recently became the second biggest stake holder, after purchasing 9.1 per cent of Twitter earlier in 2022 – taking his shares to 9.2 per cent.

The likes of Morgan Stanley and BlackRock Inc also owned shares in Twitter.

What has Elon Musk said about the future of Twitter?

In his first statement since the buyout of Twitter was confirmed, Mr Musk said he planned to open source the algorithm that ranks tweets in the content feed, to increase transparency.

He also said he wants to tackle spam bots.

Mr Musk also said he wants to authenticate all real humans – which has raised concerns about how this could affect anonymous whistle blowers on the platform.

The first thing he mentioned in his statement was ‘free speech’ calling it the ‘bedrock of a functioning democracy’, and describing Twitter as the ‘digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated’.

Could Donald Trump return to Twitter?

The former US president was permanently banned from the platform following the Capitol Riots on January 6, 2021.

But due to Mr Musk’s emphasis on free speech, it has led to speculation that Mr Trump could be allowed back on the social media platform.

However the world’s richest man has yet to say anything about Mr Trump following the buyout of Twitter.