Related merge arb markets:

This market was super fun for me despite losing 20,664 mana. I enjoyed the banter with all the folks who took my fake money and I just want to congratulate you all!

@jack Oh man I had a limit order at 98% too and I guess the only reason mine never hit is because yours was SO HUGE. Damn. Double Damn.

@BTE Some personal stats on this market:

• I traded just over 200k shares on this market! Kind of crazy to think about. That was mainly from doing a ton of market making. I'm curious how many total shares were traded on the market - the total volume of the market shows M$223,808, so my trading was apparently a sizeable fraction of all the market volume.

• I estimate I made something like 5-10k profit from my market making - it's hard to get an accurate number because of the windfall profit I got from Spindle, and because I was also doing some trading based on my own predictions. I estimate I made about 60k profit in expectation from that one limit order, considering that the fair market value settled at about 15% after Musk said he was going to take the deal again.

@jack The market volume is definitely wrong then because I traded at least 70,000 myself, probably much more, but that was my outstanding shares when Musk decided to take the deal. The volume on my Global Macro group is almost double the volume number for me on the leaderboard. In fact, the volume on this market alone is greater than the supposed combined volume across all of my markets according to the leaderboard.

Just a week until the 10/28 deadline for the deal to close or else the trial will resume. Made a shorter-term market here:

@jack Holy shit I just saw how much you have made on this market!! You’re welcome!! 😂😂

@BTE Haha yes. I did a ton of profitable market making here, but the biggest chunk of it was one big trade by Spindle lol.

@jack Was that the same traunch that put me into total meltdown??

@BTE No, that was the one after Musk said he was buying Twitter at the original terms, proving Spindle right, and then Spindle sold all their shares.

The Musk team seems very interested in getting the case to stop:

https://mobile.twitter.com/kateconger/status/1578097622216282115/photo/1

Notably this isn't a joint motion with Twitter. Will Musk give Twitter some actual incentive to agree to pause the case? If he doesn't, and Twitter doesn't, will he suddenly lose his new-found interest in closing? I can't quite tell what the angle is here.

@PeterBorah He presumably doesn't want to speak under oath for his deposition. I think twitter is right to not take "I promise to do what I agreed to this time not like last time" very seriously until the money is in hand.

@LeahLibresco If that's the case (and I agree it's a very plausible take), does he lose interest in closing if he's forced to do the deposition?

@PeterBorah Ok, the case is now stayed for a bit. The court says that if they don't close by Oct. 28, there will be a trial in November.

Musk's brief is reeeeally concerned to say "we don't have have to do the deal if the debt financing falls through". Not sure whether to read that as "we plan to cause Shenanigans about the debt financing", or if they're just paranoid about the hypothetical of having to do the deal without the financing.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/10/06/musk-seeks-to-stop-oct-17-trial-date-to-close-twitter-deal-on-original-terms.html

https://mobile.twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1577428272056389633

This suggests Musk is beginning the "I actually want to buy Twitter after all" narrative, which honestly feels like stronger evidence than the official letter.

@modz @copz I CALL SCHNENNANIGANZ this market has GRAVE ERRORZ. I will never pay back the mana u say I owe u!

Printed M$ just by playing the spread. Why are you bozos selling YES for 2% only to push it up to 98% in one big spike? That's really stupid. Get a grip?

@CalebMoore It's important to note that it's different people making those different bets and at different times. I think some people were overconfident in updating all the way to NO, some people made poor panicked sell decisions, and some people may have been intentionally trolling the market. But it's probably mostly just the normal volatility that comes with big market-moving news coming out and people reacting to it in different ways, some more correct than others.

I do agree that it's a sign of market inefficiency, which is good incentive for the market makers like us to come in and help improve the efficiency :)

@jack I could not agree more. I would personally rather make markets than trade. Liquidity provision is the most under explored element of this site.

We've seen the letter now:

https://mobile.twitter.com/chancery_daily/status/1577377535255613442/photo/1

No way Twitter agrees to "immediately stay" the litigation when Musk offers nothing in return besides "I'll really do it this time". I'm back in at these prices.

From The Verge:

Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment. It is not likely to pause its litigation, Talley says. It may want a settlement to include terms that enforce the deal — for instance, the entire purchase price going into an escrow account so that if Musk gets cold feet again, that account is simply emptied.

Both parties are likely to want a trial delay to close the deal, but it’s not clear how that may turn out, Talley says. “The lawsuit will not stop dead in its tracks. It will continue,” Talley says.

Hard to resist buying at this price, even with the recent news, since he already committed to buy twitter once! I think 7% is too low for this market since Musk made a promise to Twitter already for this price, and it's hard to have confidence he'll take a new one more seriously until the money is actually wired.