A jury has ruled that Elon Musk defrauded investors of the social media platform Twitter. The verdict found that in 2022, Musk disparaged the company with the intent of acquiring it for a price lower than his initial $44 billion offer.

A federal jury in San Francisco determined on Friday that Musk's posts, in which he claimed the platform had an excessive number of fake accounts and subsequently attempted to withdraw from the acquisition deal, constituted a deliberate deception of Twitter's shareholders.

The jury also calculated the extent to which Musk's statements depressed the company's stock price on various trading days over a period of approximately five months. The specific amount of compensation he must pay to individual investors will be determined at a later date, with potential damages reaching hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars.

This ruling represents a rare legal defeat for the world's wealthiest individual. Musk has previously been nicknamed the "Teflon" billionaire for his ability to emerge victorious from numerous high-stakes legal battles where many expected him to lose.