headline: Musk defends Twitter bot claims in securities fraud trial as shareholders allege millions lost publish_date: ‘2026-03-05’ l…

  • Elon Musk took the witness stand for a second day in a San Francisco federal courtroom Thursday, defending his assertions about fake acco…
  • The class-action lawsuit claims Musk violated federal securities laws through a series of moves intended to lower the price of his $44 bi…
  • The dispute centers on Musk’s repeated public assertions that Twitter’s bot and spam problem was far worse than the company had disclosed…
  • Former Twitter Chief Executive Ned Segal, who testified Thursday, offered sharply different figures. Segal said the actual spam account r…

Elon Musk took the witness stand for a second day in a San Francisco federal courtroom Thursday, defending his assertions about fake accounts on Twitter as a civil trial advances over allegations that his public statements drove down the company’s stock price and cost shareholders millions of dollars.

The class-action lawsuit claims Musk violated federal securities laws through a series of moves intended to lower the price of his $44 billion acquisition or abandon the deal altogether — allegations that, if proven, could result in significant damages for investors who sold Twitter shares during a five-month window in 2022.

Bot claims at the center of trial

The dispute centers on Musk’s repeated public assertions that Twitter’s bot and spam problem was far worse than the company had disclosed. Twitter stated in regulatory filings that fake and spam accounts made up approximately 5% of its user base. Musk argued the true figure was at least 20%, a claim he described Thursday in court as being as obvious as “saying the grass is green or the sky is blue.”

Former Twitter Chief Executive Ned Segal, who testified Thursday, offered sharply different figures. Segal said the actual spam account rate was closer to 1% and that Twitter did not file false disclosures with the Securities and Exchange Commission about its spam account numbers.

On Wednesday, Musk had told the court that Twitter “lied” about the number of bot accounts on its platform.

History of user-count disputes

The question of Twitter’s bot and fake account figures predates Musk’s involvement with the company. In 2021, Twitter paid $809.5 million to settle claims that it had been overstating its growth rate and monthly active user figures. The company disclosed its spam estimates to the SEC for years while cautioning that those estimates might understate the actual figure.

An earlier discrepancy surfaced in 2017, when Twitter said it had been overstating monthly user numbers by mistake because it was counting users of a third-party app that should not have been included.

Deal timeline

Musk agreed to purchase Twitter for $54.20 per share — a total of approximately $44 billion — in spring 2022. He completed the transaction six months later, in October 2022, renaming the platform X. The class-action suit represents shareholders who sold their Twitter stock between May 13 and Oct. 4, 2022, the period during which plaintiffs allege Musk’s public statements and conduct artificially depressed the share price.