Elon Musk has said his $44bn deal to buy Twitter is on hold after he queried the number of fake or spam accounts on the social media platform.
He said he was waiting for information “supporting [the] calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users”.
Mr Musk added later that he was “still committed to [the] acquisition”.
However, analysts speculated he could be seeking to renegotiate the price or even walk away from the takeover.
Mr Musk’s tweets sent Twitter’s share price plunging 10% in morning trade in New York.
Even before his comments, the company’s stock had been selling for less than the $54.20 per share Mr Musk has offered, a sign that the markets were not convinced he would complete the buyout.
Dan Ives, a tech analyst at investment firm Wedbush Securities, said Mr Musk’s comments would “send this Twitter circus show into a Friday the 13th horror show”.
“Many will view this as Musk using this Twitter filing/spam accounts as a way to get out of this deal in a vastly changing market,” he wrote in a note.
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