this post was submitted on 21 Mar 2026
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A jury has found Elon Musk liable for misleading investors by deliberately driving down Twitter's stock price in the tumultuous months leading up to his 2022 acquisition of the social media company for $44 billion. But it absolved him of some fraud allegations, finding that he did not "scheme" to mislead investors.

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[–] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 21 points 20 hours ago

That's it, again?

JAIL TIME!

If I steal a bread to feed my hungry children I'll go to jail, but this guy ficks around with billions and all he gets is a tiny slap on his fingers?

[–] brownsugga@lemmy.world 15 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

Oh No, point 2 % of his net worth

0.2%

literally less than a traffic ticket in terms of scale

[–] sunbeam60@feddit.uk 8 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago) (5 children)

I mean I dislike the guy as much as you, but almost all of his “wealth” is paper wealth. He may very well not be able to liquidate 2% of his wealth (fine with me).

[–] brownsugga@lemmy.world 1 points 11 hours ago

0.2% not 2%

[–] iglou@programming.dev 15 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

He doesn't have to liquidate shit, none of them do. They borrow against their holdings.

[–] sunbeam60@feddit.uk 1 points 12 hours ago

Yes of course. But a lot of it ain’t vested and so the terms may not be great or downright unpalatable.

[–] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 6 points 20 hours ago

Point is that if I commit fraud or steal anything over 10 dollars I might go to jail

This guy lies steals and cheats by the billions and he gets a hug

Jail the motherfucker already

[–] SCmSTR@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 21 hours ago

Reminds me of the same defense some people make in divorce court

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 1 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

Paper wealth and theoretical wealth, he will have to borrow that $2B using paper value as collateral.

[–] drislands@lemmy.world 2 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

...is Musk worth a trillion dollars now?

[–] Regrettable_incident@lemmy.world 6 points 19 hours ago

I mean, financially, yeah I think so. Which is ironic, since as a person he's worth about as much as a large turd in a small bag.

[–] melsaskca@lemmy.ca 5 points 17 hours ago

Money no longer talks. You need hard time for these societal meddlers.

[–] quarkquasar@lemmy.world 5 points 21 hours ago

He must pay a pittance, to be paid in 20 equal installments of one-twentieth of a pittance each.

[–] gwl@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

Nothing ever happens though, so he'll just take a loan and still be just as wealthy as he already was

[–] ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world 17 points 1 day ago

Drop in a bucket. He should be fined of the money he paid to buy Twitter.

[–] mechoman444@lemmy.world 55 points 2 days ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (6 children)

I don't understand why these courts charge a set fine for stuff like this. This is clearly an extremely unique case. The man is 20% shy of being a trillionaire.

What really needs to be done is they need to charge a percentage of his profits. Say 20 to 30%.

[–] ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one 2 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

This idea needs to be fine tuned. The problem is that parasitic oligarchs don’t have a real income.

For those who don’t know, the parasite oligarchs take the vast amount of stock that they own and take it to a bank. The bank gives the parasite a loan with the stock as collateral. Right off the vat, the parasite gets to claim debt on their taxes. The parasite will then take the loan and use it to buy more stock or companies or anything that generates more wealth.

Loan gets paid off with the generated wealth. Due to generous tax loop holes put into place by politicians). The parasite gets to claim that they didn’t make any money and get a tax bill of zero and sometimes a refund.

[–] mechoman444@lemmy.world 1 points 18 hours ago

This scheme is called “buy, borrow, die.” It’s legal. The stocks are typically not sold off, so capital gains taxes are avoided. Loans and debt are not taxable. It’s effectively profit with relatively low risk. The point is that the level of entry is extremely high. One must already have large amounts of money to qualify for these kinds of loans.

The problem, of course, is that if you start taxing debt, like people taking out loans, it’s not just going to be millionaires, as you called them “parasites,” paying those taxes. It will be everybody taking out a loan, including the poor and the middle class.

The proposed solution is to tax people based on net worth. If you’re worth above a certain amount, then you get taxed at a very high percentage.

With that being said, if that were the case and Elon Musk were taxed like this, he would only pay around $12–$13 billion out of the roughly $800 billion he already has. In essence, it would still be pocket change to him.

At this point, wealthy people not paying taxes has become a kind of game, who can pay the least.

[–] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 21 hours ago

What really needs to be done is they need to charge a percentage of his profits. Say 20 to 30%.

Lol. That's not how the state serves capitalism. Fixed fines!!! Gotta put the burden the poor every time.

[–] Quill7513@slrpnk.net 7 points 1 day ago

Antonin Scalea capped punative damages

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[–] Triumph@fedia.io 245 points 2 days ago (20 children)

If the punishment is a fine, it's only illegal for poor people.

The only war is class war.

[–] cannedtuna@lemmy.world 111 points 2 days ago (5 children)

Considering he’s made $400B since acquiring Twitter, this was just a minor cost of doing business.

[–] oyo@lemmy.zip 2 points 21 hours ago

And there is almost zero chance he actually pays this. If anything, it will be a fraction of the amount in 20 years after he exhausts appeals and pushes deadlines to the max.

[–] kautau@lemmy.world 56 points 2 days ago (6 children)
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[–] LedgeDrop@lemmy.zip 15 points 2 days ago (8 children)

Considering he’s made $400B since acquiring Twitter...

Serious question: How?

AFAIK, Twitter wasn't terribly profitable before they sold to Musk. Then after he purchased it, the enshittification accelerated.

How on earth does this result in $400 Billions in profit?!?

[–] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 21 hours ago

Serious question: How?

He didn't actually "make" any money. He just stole it from workers, humanity, the planet, etc.

[–] halcyoncmdr@piefed.social 28 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

He made $400B, not Twitter. That's almost entirely from Tesla and other ventures, not Twitter.

Last I've been able to find Twitter was valued at $33B when xAI bought it. But that was clearly an overvalued sale. Just look at the valuation over time.

And that's just raw valuation which is easily manipulated, not revenue or profit, which can be easily manipulated.

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[–] CovfefeKills@lemmy.world 30 points 1 day ago

That is the price of new phone for him compared to us...

[–] Mulligrubs@lemmy.world 104 points 2 days ago (1 children)

So that's like me paying a $20 fine. GOOD JOB

[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 52 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Except he almost certainly won't be paying anywhere near that amount, if anything.

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[–] WanderWisley@lemmy.world 43 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Spoiler alert: he won’t pay or admit any wrongdoing.

[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 19 points 2 days ago (1 children)

admit any wrongdoing.

So, the Trump school of leadership.

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[–] GreenBeanMachine@lemmy.world 22 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)
[–] Etterra@discuss.online 14 points 2 days ago (1 children)

That's assuming they can even get him to pay it.

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[–] Insekticus@aussie.zone 50 points 2 days ago

That's a fine of $2 out of a total of $800.

I'd speed past cameras if I was running late, and that was the fine.

[–] rogsson@piefed.social 27 points 2 days ago (5 children)

It should be % based of his income. Otherwise it’s not a punishment 

[–] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

Is this your first time in capitalism? That's how every fine works. There are no punishments for the privileged.

The president is a pedophile who has been prosecuted for like 30 felonies. They're not fining the creep at all. That's reality.

[–] yabbadabaddon@lemmy.zip 16 points 2 days ago (1 children)

This does not work because he will find a way to have 0 income (legally). I don't know how we can make the billionaires pay, but we should tax the assets not the incomes.

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[–] stephen@lazysoci.al 38 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I wish “massive white color crime” for the expediency that a “Black dude swelling a bit of weed” got.

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[–] minorkeys@lemmy.world 27 points 2 days ago (4 children)

He's made billions more after and because of it so he doesn't give a shit about a meaningless, billion dollar fine.

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[–] 13igTyme@piefed.social 14 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

I wasn't invested in Twitter, but when I heard he was trying to get out of it I bought some stock. I knew he couldn't get out of the deal because it doesn't work like that and he's a dumb ass.

My only regret was not buying more. Thanks for the money, idiot.

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[–] 1984@lemmy.today 16 points 2 days ago

So the public paid to see another billionaire do things nobody else can do and get away with it. Nice.

[–] SethTaylor@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

He'll have it back in a month...

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