Musk admits Twitter may go bust as execs quit
Twitter's new owner Elon Musk on Thursday raised the possibility of the social media platform going bankrupt, capping a chaotic day that included a warning from a US regulator and departures of senior executives viewed as future leaders. The billionaire told Twitter employees on a call that that he could not rule out bankruptcy, Bloomberg News reported, two weeks after buying it for US$44 billion – a deal that credit experts say has left Twitter's finances in a precarious position. Two executives – Yoel Roth and Robin Wheeler – who moderated a Twitter Spaces chat with Musk on Wednesday as he tried to assuage advertisers' concerns, have resigned, one person close to the matter told Reuters. Roth and Wheeler did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Bloomberg and tech site Platformer reported the exits first. Earlier on Thursday, Twitter's Chief Security Officer Lea Kissner tweeted that she had quit. Chief Privacy Officer Damien Kieran and Chief Compliance Officer Marianne Fogarty also resigned, according to an internal message posted to Twitter's Slack messaging system on Thursday by an attorney on its privacy team and seen by Reuters. The US Federal Trade Commission said it was watching Twitter with "deep concern" after these three privacy and compliance officers quit. These resignations potentially put Twitter at risk of violating regulatory orders. In his first meeting with all employees at Twitter on Thursday afternoon, Musk warned that the company may lose billions of US dollars next year, the Information reported. Twitter did not respond to requests for comment on a potential bankruptcy, the FTC warning, or the departures. Wheeler was the face of Twitter for advertising after Musk took over. Roth, who was head of safety and integrity at Twitter, has said Twitter had reduced views of harmful content in search results by 95 percent compared to before Musk's acquisition. Musk, who ruthlessly moved to clean house after taking over Twitter for US$44 billion on October 27, has said the company was losing more than US$4 million a day, largely because advertisers started fleeing once he took over. (Reuters)