Investment fund manager Fidelity has lowered the valuation of its shares in X Holdings, the company that owns the social network X, formerly known as Twitter. Fidelity helped Elon Musk buy the former Twitter, Inc, which was renamed.
At the new rating, X would have a market value 71.5% lower than at the time of purchase. The figure relates to the end of November 2023, as Fidelity makes the assessments with a one-month delay.
Compared to the previous month, it was a drop of 10.7%. For comparison, Meta’s shares rose 4.9% in November, while those of Snap (the company behind Snapchat, which is still very popular in the US) soared 38.2%.
The website Axios links this drop to the episode in which, during a TV interview, Musk was asked about the advertiser boycott of X, following anti-Semitic comments. His response was blunt: “you.”
Fidelity gave X a negative rating in the first month after Musk bought the company. The value was stable or slightly positive during the first months of 2023, but soon after it began to fall, the investment fund company’s estimates began to fall.
Even Elon Musk agrees that X has fallen
As Axios notes, Fidelity may not have much information about X’s financial situation, and other shareholders may have different valuations of the company. Since X does not have its shares traded on the stock exchange, there is no need to share information about the company’s performance.
The investment fund manager, however, does not seem to be alone in this. In September 2023, Elon Musk himself implied that he considered X to have a $40 billion drop in market value. Purchased in October 2022 for $44 billion, the network is reportedly worth $4 billion.
Officially, the negative assessment wouldn’t be that drastic. In October 2023, employees of the social network reportedly received documents about their shares in the company. According to the papers, the market value of X would be $19 billion.
