It would not be a Friday the 13th without Elon Musk tweeting out something with potentially far reaching implications.

The tweet in question this time around centres on its $44 billion acquisition of Twitter which has been put “on hold” on the back of a Reuters report which estimates the platform’s amount of fake/spam accounts to be less than 5 percent.

As the news outlet notes, one of the key tenants of Musk’s plan to reinvigorate Twitter was to address its problem with fake accounts and removing spam bots in particular.

Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of usershttps://t.co/Y2t0QMuuyn

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 13, 2022

It is unclear why this report from Reuters would alter his plans, especially as the removal of spam bots is something he has previously stated as an intention, but the most puzzling aspect of all of this is the fact that he announced what could be the biggest tech deals to date (monetarily speaking) on hold via a simple tweet.

Either way, it is another example of Musk using a social media platform as a medium to broadcast important news that impacts quite a few people.

Since his initial tweet, Musk has clarified that the acquisition will still happen, once he has ascertained the precise percentage of fake/spam accounts that exist on Twitter.

Regardless of his intentions, the tweet has had an effect, with shares of the company falling by 17.7 percent to $37.10 during pre-day trading, Reuters added in a follow up story. The news site also noted that Tesla shares were up 5 percent on the back of the aforementioned tweet.

With Musk having previously gotten into hot water for his Twitter antics with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), it looks like the maverick tech billionaire is quite happy to do as he sees fit.

Either way, the Twitter acquisition shows no signs of featuring less twists and turns before the deal gets over the line.