X worth 80 per cent less under Musk, investment giant says

X no longer trades publicly after Musk shelled out US$44 billion ($63.9 billion) to take it private in October 2022.

However, Fidelity discloses what it believes is the value of its shares of X, and those estimates serve as a closely watched barometer for the overall health of the company.

The new valuation from Fidelity implies that it believes X is now worth just US$9.4 billion ($13.65 billion) — a far cry from the US$44 billion that Musk paid. Other investors could value X differently.

Analysts say Fidelity’s plunging price tag for X likely reflects shrinking ad revenue at the company, which no longer publicly releases quarterly financial metrics.

Fidelity declined to comment on individual companies.

X did not respond to a request for comment.

“Musk clearly overpaid for this asset,” Dan Ives, managing director and senior equity analyst at Wedbush Securities, told CNN in an email.

Ives said that he believes Twitter was really worth around US$30 billion ($43.57 billion) when Musk bought it, and today it’s worth closer to US$15 billion ($21.78 billion). He said that while engagement on X is “strong,” ad pressure has persisted.

Under Musk’s ownership, some advertisers have expressed concerns about extreme content on the platform that they don’t want their brands linked to.

A recent global survey by Kantar found that a net 26 per cent of marketers plan to decrease their spending on X next year, the steepest pullback from any major global ad platform. Just four per cent of advertisers said they think X ads provide “brand safety” (certainty that their ads won’t appear near extreme content), compared with 39 per cent at Google.

In November, Musk faced a backlash from brands, some of which halted spending on X, after the billionaire embraced an antisemitic conspiracy theory favored by White supremacists.

Musk later apologised for what he called his “dumbest” ever social media posting. However, during that apology, Musk also told fleeing advertisers: “Go f— yourself.”

But X continues to be a major player in social media under Musk’s ownership.

However, research firm Similarweb has found some drops in engagement.

X had 73.5 million monthly active users on iOS and Android combined in the US in August, according to Similarweb data shared with CNN. That represents a drop of nearly 11 per cent year over year and a 20 per cent decline from October 2022.

Similarweb also found that US web traffic to X.com in August was lower than it was for Twitter.com before Musk bought it. However, Similarweb said X’s traffic numbers have been somewhat stronger outside the US.

Gene Munster, managing partner at Deepwater Asset Management, said he doesn’t believe the value of X has dropped nearly as much as Fidelity’s estimates imply.

“Fidelity was overly aggressive. They are essentially cleaning house on the investment,” Munster told CNN.

Munster said that in the long run, he thinks X and the data the company has access to will be worth more than the US$44 billion that Musk paid for Twitter.

“If you want a real-time understanding of what people are thinking, Twitter is the best source of that. And that is valuable,” Munster said.

It’s especially valuable because X data has helped train Grok, the artificial intelligence chatbot developed by xAI, Musk’s increasingly valuable AI startup.

X has emerged as the unique angle for Grok, which Munster said has the potential to be Musk’s biggest source of wealth.

“When Musk bought Twitter, investors didn’t realise we’d be taking off on AI as fast as we are,” Munster said.

“Musk buying Twitter is a case of better lucky than smart.”