Elon Musk wants X to run your whole financial life. Not just payments. Not just messages. Everything. That’s the plan. He says the rebrand from Twitter to X wasn’t just a facelift. It’s the start of something bigger.
“Comprehensive communications and the ability to conduct your entire financial world,” Elon said in an interview. No more switching apps. No more banks. Just X.
Elon also said it would be the most efficient money database ever built. He promised real-time processing, low fraud, and a system so big, it could become “half the global financial system.” His words, not ours:
“I don’t know, maybe half the global financial system. Or some big number. I’m not sure what the number is, but pretty big. It would be by far the biggest financial institution.”
Musk ignores past [and current] failures and wants to build the next WeChat
Elon wants X to beat WeChat, the Chinese app that’s used for texting, shopping, sending money, paying bills, and even borrowing cash, which over a billion people use.
But here’s the problem for the golden boy. Other tech giants already tried this, and they all failed. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg had Libra, and it was supposed to be this big cross-border payments project, but it got killed by regulators and Facebook’s own users.
Google had a financial tool lined up with 11 banks that never launched. Amazon had talks with JPMorgan Chase to build a checking account, and nothing happened. Microsoft worked with BlackRock on retirement planning, and that plan disappeared too.
Only Apple got something off the ground when it launched the Apple Card with Goldman Sachs in 2019. But hilariously enough, now Goldman wants out because the product is simply not profitable enough. So yeah—there’s a track record here. And it’s not great.
Elon is already facing heat from regulators. The SEC just hit him with a lawsuit for not disclosing his stock purchases in Twitter before trying to buy the company in 2022.
A court filing says a process server showed up at SpaceX in Brownsville, Texas on March 14 to serve the papers. But three guards refused to take the documents. One even told the guy he was trespassing. So the server left the paperwork on the ground. The guards snapped pictures of him and his car while he walked off.
According to the court, Elon was supposed to file a disclosure within 10 days of owning more than 5% of Twitter. He didn’t. He waited longer. The SEC says that delay let him underpay by at least $150 million for the shares he grabbed after the deadline.
The case was filed in Washington, D.C., and Elon has to respond by April 4. He can also file to dismiss it. This isn’t his first dance with the SEC either. Back in the Tesla days, he got hit with civil fraud charges. That time, he paid $20 million, Tesla paid $20 million, and he had to step down as chairman of Tesla’s board.
X raises money, recovers valuation, and pulls in earnings
Despite all this, X is raising money and pulling in numbers. A Bloomberg report says the platform raised nearly $1 billion in new funds. That deal puts X’s value at $32 billion. Yes, that’s lower than what Elon paid for it, but still a huge rebound. Remember—Fidelity said in September the company was worth under $10 billion. That’s a big jump in a few months.
The Financial Times also dropped some numbers. They say X made $1.2 billion in adjusted earnings in 2024. That’s before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization. And yeah, it’s roughly the same amount the platform made before Elon bought it. So even though ad revenue dropped and users left, somehow the earnings stayed up.
That same report from the Financial Times puts X’s valuation back at $44 billion, matching what Elon paid for it back in 2022. Two different valuations—$32 billion from Bloomberg, $44 billion from FT—but either way, it’s clear the company made a big recovery.
And yes, Elon helped fund that $1 billion raise himself. Not just outside investors. His own money went in.
Meanwhile, Elon is busy in Washington. After taking over Twitter, he used the platform to back president Donald Trump and other Republican politicians. According to filings, he spent $290 million to help Trump get back into office. Now, he’s a top advisor inside the Trump administration.
That new role might help explain what’s going on at the SEC. Trump’s White House just cut the agency’s budget and staff. Employees were offered $50,000 buyouts to leave or retire by March 21. That’s right around the same time the SEC filed the civil complaint against Elon.
Trump also changed a long-standing SEC rule. For the past 15 years, the agency’s enforcement director could issue investigation orders directly. That power is gone now. All formal investigations have to go through the commissioners and get a vote. That slows everything down. Including cases like the one targeting Elon.
So while X raises cash and posts numbers, its owner is knee-deep in court dates, politics, lawsuits, and a powerful affair with the leader of the free world. And through all of it, he’s still pushing to turn X into the main hub for global money. From texts to transfers. From tweets to loans. It’s no wonder Elon has backtracked on his crypto support.
