TWITTER OFFERS ELON MUSK BOARD SEAT. ASX AND WALL STREET FALL ON FEARS RATE RISES COULD…

Twitter offers Elon Musk board seat. ASX and Wall Street fall on fears rate rises could lead to recession

Twitter has offered billionaire Elon Musk a seat on its board after the Tesla founder bought a big stake in the social media firm. and US stocks have fallen. The Nasdaq fell 2.3pc to 14.204. the Dow Jones index lost 0.8pc to 34.641 and the S&P 500 fell 1.3pc to 4.525 The FTSE 100 index rose 0.7pc to 7.614. the DAX in Germany fell 0.7pc to 14.424. and the CAC 40 fell 1.3pc to 6.645 Mr Musk disclosed yesterday in a regulatory filing that he had bought a 9.2 per cent stake in Twitter in March. making him the company’s largest shareholder. His nearly $US3 billion investment is four times larger than that of Twitter founder Jack Dorsey. who stepped down as chief executive in November. Twitter’s chief executive Parag Agrawal said in a tweet that in conversations with Mr Musk in recent weeks ‘it became clear to us that he would bring great value to our board.’ ‘He’s both a passionate believer and intense critic of the service which is exactly what we need on Twitter. and in the boardroom. to make us stronger in the long term.’ Mr Agrawal tweeted. Mr Musk tweeted that he was looking forward to working with the Twitter board ‘to make significant improvements to Twitter in coming months’. Reuters reported that Mr Musk would be involved in strategic decisions. including the direction of Twitter’s Bluesky project and the addition of an edit button. which he set up a poll on Twitter for users to vote on. But Mr Agrawal warned users to think carefully about the addition of an edit function. Mr Musk will not have a say on the platform’s moderation. including what speech gets banned or whose accounts get restored. a policy that applies to all board members. Bluesky is a company funded by Twitter to develop a new operating standard for social media. Twitter shares rose 2 per cent. following yesterday’s 27 per cent surge on the news of Mr Musk’s investment. ASX follows Wall Street lower The local share market opened in the red after US stocks slumped on fears that rapid rises in official US interest rates could cause a recession in North America. At 10:15am AEST. the All Ordinaries index fell 1 per cent. to 7.754. while the ASX 200 index dropped 1 per cent as well. to 7.453 with all sectors in the red. Miners. utilities. and technology stocks were among the worst hit. Leading the falls in early trade were battery materials firm Novonix ( 4.5pc). nickel firm Liontown Resources ( 4pc) and rare earths miner Lynas Rare Earths ( 3.9pc). The best performers were medical device firm Polynovo (+7.4pc) on record first quarter revenue. transport company Kelsian Group (+2.5pc) and coal miner Whitehaven Coal (+2.4pc). The European Union is proposing a potential ban on Russian coal imports because of the invasion of Ukraine. BGH Capital raised its takeover bid for IVF provider Virtus Health (+0.6pc) to $8 a share. At 10:30am AEST. the Australian dollar was buying around 75.90 US cents. up 0.15 per cent. It surged to 76.61 US cents overnight after the Reserve Bank signalled it was getting ready to raise official interest rates. Crown facing $100 million fine Victoria’s gaming regulator has started disciplinary action against Crown for allowing Chinese high rollers to use a Chinese bank card. China Union Pay. to bypass that country’s currency restrictions. The Victorian royal commission into Crown found that the casino group had assisted Chinese high rollers to illegally transfer up to $160 million in funds out of China. It found that Crown was not fit to hold a casino licence. but recommended that Crown be allowed to keep its licence under strict conditions. That scheme had worked. the commission found. because Crown’s hotel in Melbourne issued a room charge bill to the patron. which falsely stated that the hotel provided services. The customer would then pay their bill using the China Union Pay card and be given a voucher which would be exchanged for cash or chips at the casino. Crown could face a fine of up to $100 million. Fran Thorn —…

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