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A U.S. judge on Thursday dismissed X Corp.’s antitrust lawsuit that accused the World Federation of Advertisers and major companies including Mars, CVS Health and Colgate-Palmolive of illegally boycotting billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk’s social media company.
U.S. District Judge Jane Boyle in the federal court in Dallas said X failed to show it had suffered any harm under federal antitrust laws.
The company’s lawsuit, filed in 2024, said the advertisers, acting through a World Federation of Advertisers initiative called Global Alliance for Responsible Media, collectively withheld “billions of dollars in advertising revenue” from X, previously known as Twitter.
X and the World Federation of Advertisers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The lawsuit claimed the advertisers acted against their own economic self-interests in a conspiracy against the platform that violated U.S. antitrust law.
CVS and the other defendants had denied any wrongdoing and urged Boyle to dismiss the lawsuit. They argued X failed to show they acted in unison rather than making individual business decisions about when and where to spend ad dollars.
The companies in a court filing in the lawsuit said advertisers independently chose rival platforms due to concerns about X’s commitment to brand safety following Musk’s 2022 takeover, during which he fired employees they said had kept the site “welcoming to users and accommodating to family-friendly brands.”
Boyle wrote in her order that “the very nature of the alleged conspiracy does not state an antitrust claim, and the court therefore has no qualm dismissing with prejudice.”
Defrauded shareholders
Musk’s takeover of Twitter and sometimes tumultuous stewardship has sparked litigation.
Musk has also sued Media Matters for America, after the liberal advocacy group’s 2023 report highlighted examples of antisemitic material appearing next to advertisements for blue chip companies like Apple and Oracle on X.
X alleged that Media Matters manipulated algorithms on the platform to create images of advertisers’ paid posts next to the incendiary content. The case is ongoing.
A U.S. federal jury last week found Musk liable for claims he defrauded Twitter shareholders by trying to drive down the social media company’s stock price so he could renegotiate or back out of a $44 billion US takeover in 2022.
On Thursday, a lawyer for Musk urged a federal judge to review that verdict, saying jurors improperly used the verdict to “send a message” by finding him liable.
French police on Tuesday raided the offices of Elon Musk’s social media network X and prosecutors have ordered the tech billionaire to face questions in April related to a widening investigation into the platform, including alleged ‘complicity’ of possessing and spreading child sexual abuse images and deepfakes.
In a letter filed on Thursday in San Francisco federal court, Musk’s lawyer Alex Spiro also accused jurors of “mocking” his client by writing the number “$4.20” in bright blue on the verdict form, though the remaining entries were written in black.
The number 420 is associated with marijuana culture. Musk, the world’s richest person, has often mentioned 420 in interviews and tweets, and used it in business activities for his various companies.
Musk valued Twitter, now known as X, at $54.20 US per share in his $44 billion US buyout.
Spiro said the jury’s “numerical joke” was “no doubt intentional,” and when added to other alleged trial errors called into question the March 20 verdict, where damages could reach $2.5 billion US. He said “further inquiry” by U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, who oversees the case, was needed.
“The inescapable conclusion from the face of the verdict form is that the jury felt it appropriate to use its verdict to send a message to Mr. Musk, instead of properly discharging its solemn duty to render a just verdict,” Spiro wrote.
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Frank Bottini and Mark Molumphy, two of the investors’ lawyers, in a joint statement called Spiro’s letter meritless.
“It is unfortunate that Musk has again decided to criticize the court and the jury, rather than take accountability for his own conduct,” Bottini and Molumphy said. “Given the overwhelming evidence presented at trial, it goes beyond the pale to attack an extremely diligent jury simply for doing its job.”
Jurors found Musk liable for two statements he made not long after announcing the buyout, where he questioned whether Twitter was overrun by fake and spam accounts, known as bots. They did not find him liable for a third statement about bots, or for scheming to defraud.
Twitter investors said Musk criticized the company to force it to renegotiate his offer, or let him back out. They said Musk’s comments hurt Twitter’s stock price, causing losses when they sold their shares at depressed prices.
