I know it's a big ask, but it would be kind of nice if HN added a flag context situation so one could flag a comment as "has literally no idea about how corporations work" rather than just a generic flag.
Um, I'm afraid you might be the one getting flagged :)
Shareholder pressure, which was rumored to include governors and ag's in states with pension investments in twitter who don't like twitter, was out there.
They risked a decline of twitter's stock price if Elon withdrew his offer AND sold his (largish) block of shares AND announced a competing service with some of his billions.
Twitter has its HQ in SF, but that doesn't mean it can blow florida pension money because they don't like musk.
So yes, the board, taking into consideration shareholders and their duty there, may have been in a tough spot. It certainly doesn't seem like they got any increase in price.
So, as a rough, the board determines what happens, and the shareholders can notionally replace the board. The board _can_ listen to the shareholders, but are by no means obligated to and in the case of Twitter in particular, the board elections happen on a staggered rotating basis so even a majority shareholder could not immediately replace enough of the board to obtain a majority.
This is totally false. The board owes a fiduciary duty to shareholders. It is almost certain that if they imploded the deal for political reasons that places like florida would have sued.
The fiduciary duty exceeds expressed shareholder preferences -- if the board believes that a particular action is not likely to improve value, they don't have to do it, even if all their shareholders tell them to (though, of course, they might be likely to be voted out in the next election for same).
Shareholder pressure, which was rumored to include governors and ag's in states with pension investments in twitter who don't like twitter, was out there.
They risked a decline of twitter's stock price if Elon withdrew his offer AND sold his (largish) block of shares AND announced a competing service with some of his billions.
Twitter has its HQ in SF, but that doesn't mean it can blow florida pension money because they don't like musk.
So yes, the board, taking into consideration shareholders and their duty there, may have been in a tough spot. It certainly doesn't seem like they got any increase in price.