First he wanted, then he didn't want to, now he wants again: Tech billionaire Elon Musk wants to complete the multi-billion dollar takeover of the online service Twitter after several turns. The Tesla boss confirmed this on Tuesday in a mandatory notification to the US Securities and Exchange Commission. In this way, the legal dispute over the billion-euro deal could be avoided shortly before the eagerly awaited court case.

In a letter, Musk suggested that the deal be completed at the originally agreed purchase price of $54.20 per share, his lawyers said, confirming a report by the Bloomberg financial service. This marks a spectacular turning point in the conflict surrounding the takeover, which cost around 44 billion dollars. A statement from Twitter was initially not available.

Musk canceled the April purchase agreement in July because Twitter allegedly misrepresented the number of fake accounts on its platform. However, the company insisted on compliance with the purchase agreement and went to court. The process is actually supposed to start in October to clarify whether Musk can withdraw from the takeover.

The reasons for Musk's rethinking remained unclear for the time being. Many experts assessed his chances in the court case as unfavorable from the start. For months, Musk tried to portray allegedly false information from Twitter about the number of spam and fake accounts as a breach of the takeover agreements. But whether that would be enough in court is doubtful.

In August, Musk came up with new arguments in an attempt to call off the multi-billion dollar takeover of Twitter. The Tesla boss brought up allegations by a whistleblower who accused Twitter of, among other things, insufficient protection of user data and other security weaknesses. Because of these "outrageous" flaws, Musk's purchase offer for Twitter was to be classified as invalid, his lawyers wrote to the company at the time.