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Elon Musk says $63.7 billion Twitter takeover could move ahead with bot info

Elon Musk says his planned $US44 billion ($63.7 billion) takeover of Twitter should move forward if the company can confirm some details about how it measures whether user accounts are “spam bots” or real people.

The billionaire and Tesla CEO have been trying to back out of his April agreement to buy the social media company, leading Twitter to sue him last month to complete the acquisition.

Mr Musk countersued, accusing Twitter of misleading his team about the true size of its user base and other problems he said amounted to fraud and breach of contract.

Both sides are headed toward an October trial in a Delaware court.

“If Twitter simply provides their method of sampling 100 accounts and how they’re confirmed to be real, the deal should proceed on original terms,” ​​Mr Musk tweeted.

“However, if it turns out that their SEC filings are materially false, then it should not.”

Mr Musk, who has more than 100 million Twitter followers, went on to challenge Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal to a “public debate about the Twitter bot percentage.”

Twitter declined to comment.

The company has repeatedly disclosed to the Securities and Exchange Commission an estimate that fewer than 5 per cent of user accounts are fake or spam, with a disclaimer that it could be higher.

Mr Musk waived his right to further due diligence when he signed the April merger agreement.

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