Elon Musk, the CEO of electric car giant Tesla, will face trial on Tuesday over allegedly manipulating the stock market with a 2018 tweet which claimed that he had sufficient funding to take Tesla private, causing a whirlwind in the company’s share price.
Musk was swiftly sued by shareholders for allegedly costing them billions of dollars with the Twitter post that said funding was “secured” to buy out the company’s shareholders.
Judge Edward Chen on Friday refused to transfer the proceedings to Texas, the southern state where Musk moved Tesla’s headquarters and jury selection is scheduled to begin on Tuesday, AFP reported citing a spokesperson for the court.
Defence lawyers had argued that Elon Musk would be denied a fair trial in San Francisco, where most of the fired Twitter workers reside.
According to Bloomberg, Judge Chen expressed confidence at the hearing that impartial jurors could be chosen.
Musk’s short tweet in 2018 has already attracted the attention of authorities.
The US stock market regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission, ordered that Musk step down as chairman of the board of Tesla and pay a fine of US$20 million.