On Monday, Oct. 10, Twitter's shares dropped by 14 percent as it appeared that potential buyers were backing off from a potential acquisition of the social media platform.
There were previous reports that Apple, Google and Disney all had interest in purchasing Twitter. Apple and Google would largely benefit from such an acquisition in terms of expanding in the social media industry, while Disney has been tapped as a possible buyer due to current Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey being a board member of the entertainment company since 2013.
However, reports over the weekend revealed that the three companies have decided that they will not buy Twitter.
Salesforce, another suitor to acquire Twitter, could also be rethinking its plans to buy the social media platform. At a company conference last week, investors told Salesforce CFO Mark Hawkins and other executives that they did not like the idea of a Twitter takeover, a person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg. The sentiment against the possible purchase of Twitter was made known through huddles and pocket meetings at the conference, with certain high-profile investors also sending emails to Hawkins regarding their disapproval of the deal.
Salesforce, along with all the other possible buyers of Twitter, saw the prices of its shares drop ever since being attached to the potential purchase of the social media platform. After the decision to pass on making a bid for Twitter was revealed, the companies all saw their stock prices inch back up.
With Salesforce now seemingly being added to the list of buyers backing out of acquiring Twitter, what will come next for the social media platform?
Twitter had enjoyed a 33 percent surge in share prices until Wednesday last week, Oct. 5, amid the possible takeover talks that started in late September. However, since the following day of Oct. 6, stocks have decreased by about 31 percent, including the 14 percent drop on Monday, to $17.17 per share, which is below the price from before the acquisition rumors started and in effect wiping off $5 billion from the company's market capitalization.
While it is still possible that a buyer would step in at this point, as Twitter's market value is now at only $12 billion with the chance to go even lower, Dorsey would now have to prove that the changes that he has applied in the company since coming back as CEO in July of last year would lead to significant gains in revenue and number of users.
Twitter is making a huge push into live video, which will serve as the foundation for a bigger initiative into video advertising. An example of a move connected to this is the partnership to live stream NFL games, the first of which was launched last month.
