Revenue Decline of X Platform After Musk's Acquisition

TapTechNews June 19 - Just as Elon Musk had predicted, the revenue of the platform X (formerly known as Twitter) has significantly declined since his acquisition.

Bloomberg-obtained regulatory filings show that the revenue of the X platform in the first half of 2023 was $1.48 billion, a decrease of approximately 40% compared to the first half of 2022. Musk completed the acquisition of Twitter in October 2022 for $44 billion.

Filings also show that the X platform suffered a loss of $456 million in the first quarter of 2023.

TapTechNews noted that Musk's relationship with the advertising industry has always been tense, and advertising is the main source of revenue for the X platform. Last year, Musk publicly abused advertisers with vulgar words at an event because many advertisers including Disney, IBM, Apple, and Lionsgate Movies stopped advertising on the platform due to a post by Musk that was accused of being anti-Semitic. Last year, there were also reports that some ads appeared next to content promoting white supremacy and anti-Semitism, which also led advertisers to flee the platform.

The filing obtained by Bloomberg is that the X submitted to state regulatory agencies in an effort to establish a peer-to-peer payment platform similar to Venmo. There is also a notable detail in the filing: Although Musk has always been interested in cryptocurrency, the X payment department told the Maine regulatory agency that they have no plans to support virtual currency transactions.

As one of the co-founders of PayPal, Musk has outlined a grand vision of turning the X platform into an 'all-purpose application', stating that users can build their 'entire financial world' on this platform. He had previously proposed the launch of high-yield savings accounts on the X platform to encourage users to keep their funds on the platform.