Tesla co-founder Elon Musk received a flood of criticism when he bought Twitter but his move appears to be paying off.
While many advertisers left X, contributing to a decline in total revenue, the company is more profitable now than it was before Musk took over.
The company brought in $5 billion in revenue in 2021, the last full year before Musk took over, and reported earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of $682 million, X recently reported to shareholders, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The company also reported that while X’s 2024 revenue was just more than half of pre-Musk levels at $2.7 billion, the EBITDA was nearly double what it was before Musk took over. X reported $1.25 billion in 2024 earnings. (RELATED: SEC Sues Elon Musk For Buying ‘Artificially Low’-Priced Twitter Stock. His Critics Agreed He Overpaid)
The company is bringing in less total money, but it’s more profitable under Musk, at least in part due to low overhead from slashing employees.
The apparent success so far greatly contrasts with the predictions and analysis made by several commentators and media outlets. When Musk bought the company for $44 billion in 2022, most critics derided his purchase.
In October 2023, economist Paul Krugman bashed Musk’s project and predicted he would lead his platform into a “death spiral.”
“X, formerly Twitter, may soon offer a lesson in what it takes to make a nexus implode,” Krugman wrote in The New York Times.
In the British publication, The Guardian, former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich lambasted Musk’s decision to fire the majority of Twitter’s workforce, over 6,000 employees.
“Without this knowledge and talent, Twitter is a shell – an office building, some patents and a brand – without the capacity to improve or even sustain its service,” he wrote. “It’s unlikely to fail all at once, but bugs and glitches will mount, the quality of what’s offered will deteriorate, hateful tweets will burgeon, and customers and advertisers will flee.”
KRAKOW, POLAND – JANUARY 22: SpaceX, X (formerly known as Twitter), and Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks during live interview with Ben Shapiro at the symposium on fighting antisemitism on January 22, 2024 in Krakow, Poland. The symposium on anti-semitism, organized by the European Jewish Association, was held ahead of international Holocaust remembrance day on January 27. (Photo by Omar Marques/Getty Images)
Tesla CEO Elon Musk gives interviews as he arrives at the Offshore Northern Seas 2022 (ONS) meeting in Stavanger, Norway on August 29, 2022. – The meeting, held in Stavanger from August 29 to September 1, 2022, presents the latest developments in Norway and internationally related to the energy, oil and gas sector. (Photo by CARINA JOHANSEN/NTB/AFP via Getty Images)
Dave Troy, a columnist for The Washington Spectator, went so far as to suggest Musk was destroying Twitter on purpose.
“Musk is doing to Twitter what Kevin McCarthy and Steve Bannon intend for the ‘administrative state’ next year: dismantle it,” Troy tweeted Nov. 5, 2022.
1/Musk is doing to Twitter what Kevin McCarthy and Steve Bannon intend for the “administrative state” next year: dismantle it.
Dorsey said “Elon is the singular solution I trust” to make Twitter into a “protocol” and no longer a “company.” This is quite visibly happening.
— Dave Troy (@davetroy) November 5, 2022
“Elon Musk Has Been A Disaster For Twitter,” wrote Vanity Fair.
The Atlantic also used “disaster.”
Criticizing the structure of the loans Musk took from seven major banks to fund his purchase, The Wall Street Journal called the agreement the “Worst Buyout for Banks Since the Financial Crisis.”
Former NBC News reporter Ben Collins speculated that the website could go dark entirely.
“It’s already failing,” he told Forbes. “It currently has no sustainable way to make money. Will it literally stop being a website at some point? I’m not sure, but it’s not out of the question.”
After an initially rocky start, the future looks bright for X as advertisers are returning.
Apple, who had publicly announced it was no longer advertising on the platform in 2023, is considering a comeback, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Amazon also announced they were upping its ad spending on the platform.
