this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2025
267 points (97.2% liked)

News

28227 readers
5092 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Summary

Elon Musk announced that his AI startup xAI has merged with his social media platform X in an all-stock deal, valuing xAI at $80 billion and X at $33 billion.

Musk stated the merger will combine AI expertise with X’s broad reach.

xAI, launched less than two years ago, competes with OpenAI and has developed the Grok chatbot, integrated with X.

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com 230 points 3 days ago (2 children)

why does this feel like a twitter bailout. so he gets to shuffle the financial deck of these 2 so twitter isnt a complete failure monetarily?

[–] Transform2942@lemmy.ml 120 points 3 days ago (1 children)

yes, he uses the hype investor cash that poured into the ai boondogle to cover his insane twitter purchase and literally bail himself out of his stupidity

[–] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 49 points 3 days ago (6 children)

How do i do that with a mortgage?

[–] meco03211@lemmy.world 44 points 3 days ago (1 children)

You need another property. Work a shady deal with a bank to massively overvalue that property. Borrow against that equity.

"Well what do I do with an overvalued loan on my other property now?" I hear you ask. Simple! Have another another property. Work a shady deal to massively overvalue...

[–] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 18 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Gotcha. Ok, please recommend a shady bank that is interested in sketchiness at my level

[–] baldingpudenda@lemmy.world 19 points 3 days ago

axos bank apparently, but you got to know the shareholders.

[–] Transform2942@lemmy.ml 19 points 3 days ago (1 children)

That depends, do you have the "rich" status condition?

[–] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 14 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I have not yet unlocked that perk

[–] winkerjadams@lemmy.dbzer0.com 14 points 3 days ago

Keep tuggin on them bootstraps and you'll get there eventually

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] MuskyMelon@lemmy.world 28 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

It's not a xhitter bailout. It's a robbery of shareholder investment.

If he wants to use xhitter content for grok, that's gonna be most fucked up LLM of all.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] khannie@lemmy.world 48 points 3 days ago

valuing xAI at $80 billion and X at $33 billion

[–] lupusblackfur@lemmy.world 97 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Hmm...

Manipulating stocks between companies you own for fun and profit...

Sounds pretty Ferengi to me.

And no accountings shall be held...

🙄 🤡 🤦‍♀️ 🖕

[–] Rookwood@lemmy.dbzer0.com 21 points 3 days ago

Elon has violated securities laws blatantly for years now. Yeah, he won't be held accountable. And a good half of people still wonder why inequality is such a bad thing.

[–] SeaJ@lemm.ee 15 points 3 days ago

He essentially did the same thing with Solar City a decade ago. Although that was "owned" by his cousins and he bailed them out with by buying it for a few billion.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world 28 points 3 days ago (3 children)

He added that the merger would, “unlock immense potential by blending xAI’s advanced AI capability and expertise with X’s massive reach."

He already owns and runs Xitter as a propaganda tool. Now he's openly mixing it with his own bots.

Does anyone else get a really bad feeling about this? I see a lot of comments talking about this financially, but I haven't seen any comments talking about the disinformation potential that comes with artificially seeding a social media site with his own AI bots. Granted, Grok's responses have been based (so far), but that's not guaranteed to last.

I don't know exactly what the game plan is here, but the pieces are all laid out for Musk to spread his influence behind AI anonymity. That worries me.

[–] _cryptagion@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 2 days ago

No, I'm not getting a really bad feeling about it, any more than I get a bad feeling about the other right-wing social media sites. If they want their own little echo chamber because they don't feel safe on ones they don't control, then great. It gets them off of social media the rest of us use.

As for it reinforcing their bad behavior, that's going to happen no matter what. These people want to be hateful little shits, and no amount of hand-wringing about misinformation is gonna change that. If Elon wasn't a nazi, they would just go search out something controlled by somebody who was.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Pondis@lemmy.world 80 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Two companies no one wanted now one company no one wants.

[–] Postmortal_Pop@lemmy.world 54 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Company worthless? Sell it to yourself for a ludicrous cost to increase your market value!

You mad, wage slaves?

[–] azimir@lemmy.ml 33 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Then immediately borrow real money against the paper value of your new merger company. Pocket a few billion and use some to bribe the feds to not audit you.

It's crime all the way down.

[–] OldWoodFrame@lemm.ee 50 points 3 days ago (4 children)

Market cap of Twitter was $41B, Musk overpaid at $44B,

Fidelity valued it at $9.4B late last year.

xAI paid $33B for it this year.

So this is a significantly worse overpay.

[–] Kichae@lemmy.ca 24 points 3 days ago

This is just his left hand paying his right so he can claim Twitter's value is comparable to what he initally paid for it. He's getting fixated on people talking about his losses again, and is getting ready to call someone a pedo on main again.

[–] gamer@lemm.ee 11 points 2 days ago

It's all to defraud investors. The SEC isn't going to touch him, and when the earnings report for Tesla is due I bet it's going to show that the woke libtards were wrong and Tesla sales actually quadrupled in the past 4 months.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] demizerone@lemmy.world 31 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I hope I make it out alive of the scam economy. This mother sucker gets away with murder and I have dodge scammers left and right bcz there is no justice or rule of law.

[–] Bakkoda@sh.itjust.works 7 points 3 days ago

The other day i said something along the lines of the economy having a valuation problem and i was assured that that's inaccurate and only the stock market has a valuation problem. So the economy is fine.

/s

[–] Hobbes_Dent@lemmy.world 49 points 3 days ago

I was also today years old when I read a headline about DOGE heading into the SEC.

Weird.

[–] frunch@lemmy.world 37 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Honestly wasn't sure if they were talking about one of his children when they said xAI

[–] sporkler@lemmy.world 16 points 3 days ago

Pronounced 'barbara'

[–] ThomasCrappersGhost@feddit.uk 18 points 3 days ago

His company has bought his company? That doesn’t sound right even in USA.

[–] Clinicallydepressedpoochie@lemmy.world 32 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

This is just oligarchs moving their chess pieces around. Expect nothing to come of it. Expect elon to face zero consequences.

It shouldn't be hard. If you accept the existence of billionaires you accept that some people shouldn't ever face consequences and be rewarded for toxic behavior.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 41 points 3 days ago

Neither of those valuations are supported by reality.

[–] SatanClaus@lemmy.dbzer0.com 42 points 3 days ago (3 children)

How is this even legal. Fuck

[–] DogPeePoo@lemm.ee 12 points 3 days ago

“I will make it legal…”

—Senator Palpatine

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] ElcaineVolta@kbin.melroy.org 37 points 3 days ago

oh cool, I just bought my own student loans and it says here that the federal government now owes me triple back what I've paid plus interest, isn't that something?!

[–] blady_blah@lemmy.world 25 points 3 days ago

xAI is 80 billion? That's a load of shit.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 33 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Musk stated the merger will combine AI expertise with X’s broad reach.

Ah yes, the famous combining two losing strategies, so they can lose money twice as efficiently.

[–] CmdrShepard42@lemm.ee 11 points 3 days ago (2 children)

This reminds me of when Kmart bought Sears.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] DogPeePoo@lemm.ee 31 points 3 days ago

So… fraud.

[–] sibachian@lemmy.ml 16 points 3 days ago (1 children)

while he simultaneously claims AI is less than a decade away from eradicating all humans. how very philanthropist of him.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 11 points 3 days ago

I think he made an attempt to force regulation on it, with the purpose of delaying development so he could catch up, because he is way way behind.

[–] CritFail@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I used to think it was a straight market manipulation to short the market, coupled with a crypto scam.

Here's my latest prediction for the next step: as well as being a geopolitical tool, I think they plan to use Trump's tariffs as a way to funnel more tax revenue into US Government to be directly laundered for themselves personally. The reduced order volume doesn't matter to them because 25%, 50%, 100% or whatever tariff they charge goods and services will go straight to the US government to be compliantly fed into Musk's ever-expanding business interests via government contracts. Some of those in the loop get vested stock options and get to run away with exponentially more money than they would without tariffs. Musk has already paid his dues so probably thinks they owe him.

They already tried to alter an agreement for 480,000 contract to Tesla for armed cybertrucks to be 480,000,000 and backdated it to look like it was agreed by Biden last year.

I expect to see a multi-billion AI contract awarded solely to xAI in the near future.

[–] SeaJ@lemm.ee 20 points 3 days ago (3 children)

He can't even justify to himself that Twitter is worth the $44 billion he (and investors) paid for it.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] GoodOleAmerika@lemmy.world 16 points 3 days ago (4 children)

He is struggling. Keep it going folks. Let's send this mofo back to South Africa. Not sure if they even want him.

[–] Formfiller@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago

I guess we can all settle with a dog cage in Guantanamo then

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] Steve@startrek.website 19 points 3 days ago (1 children)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Punchshark@lemmy.ca 17 points 3 days ago (1 children)

The only Illigal thing in murica now is being poor

[–] blady_blah@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago

And protesting against Israel.

[–] melsaskca@lemmy.ca 9 points 3 days ago

"Hmmm...I think it's worth seventyhundrillion...yeah that sounds right...seventyhundrillion".

[–] AbidanYre@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago (1 children)

So we're just making shit up now?

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›