It seems as if Musk and Twitter go hand-in-hand. When Elon Musk mulled taking Tesla private in 2018, he posted on Twitter to tell the world about it. When he got stuck in traffic in 2016, he tweeted the idea of an underground tunnel system to alleviate “soul-destroying” congestion. And when he challenged President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to one-on-one combat last month, he broadcast it on Twitter. And now Musk is investing where his words pour.

 

Elon Musk and Twitter

 

In a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission revealed Musk, the billionaire chief executive of Tesla and SpaceX and the world’s wealthiest person, had bought a 9.2% stake in Twitter, the social media platform where he has over 80 million followers. The purchase appears to make Musk Twitter’s largest shareholder, ahead of the 8.8% stake owned by the mutual-fund company Vanguard and dwarfing the 2.3% stake of Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s former chief executive.

Musk’s Twitter investment, which he has been accumulating since at least last month, was worth about $2.89 billion based on the closing price of the company’s stock on Friday. But by the end of Monday, after news of his buy-in sent Twitter’s share price soaring more than 27 percent, it was worth about $3.7 billion. The shares are a fraction of Mr. Musk’s reported $270 billion-plus net worth.

 

Musk and Twitter Penchant

 

Despite his penchant for sharing everything on Twitter — from business ideas, insults and memes to, this past weekend, his experience at a famed Berlin nightclub — Mr. Musk was uncharacteristically mum on the purchase of the company’s shares, at least initially.

“Oh hi lol” he tweeted on Monday without elaborating after news of his investment had spread across Twitter. Mr. Musk, 50, did not respond to a request for comment. Twitter declined to comment.

Musk has bought into Twitter at a delicate time for the company, which is based in San Francisco. Mr. Dorsey stepped down as chief executive in November and plans to leave the company’s board when his term ends this year, after facing down an activist shareholder and grappling with criticism from lawmakers and regulators about free speech, censorship and toxic content.

 

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