False Hope: The Street Believed Twitter & Salesforce Rumors For Too Long

Twitter Inc TWTR shares are getting hammered once again on Friday as hopes of a salesforce.com, inc. CRM buyout may now be completely extinguished.

Financial Times is reporting that Salesforce has ruled out a bit for Twitter, sending Salesforce shares soaring 5.4 percent and Twitter shares plummeting 6.1 percent.

Remember When?

Benzinga Pro first reported on October 5 that Salesforce’s largest shareholder, Fidelity Management, has been opposed to a potential Twitter buyout from the beginning.

Related Link: Exclusive: Salesforce's Largest Holder Does Not Want Company To Buy Twitter

Benzinga Pro followed up with a report on October 6 that a potential Salesforce bid for Twitter was discussed back in early July, but that potential bid represented little or no premium to Twitter’s share price at the time. Twitter’s share price was around $17 at the time.

Since the beginning of 2016, a number of Twitter buyout rumors pushed the stock as high as $25.26 by early October. It seemed every day, there was another report on Twitter bidders, but with very little context. However, potential Twitter suitors have been dropping like flies in recent weeks.

Since Benzinga reported that Fidelity Management was opposed to a Twitter deal, Twitter shares have been trading mostly around the $18 level. Now that FT seems to have confirmed that a Salesforce deal will not be happening, Twitter shares are on track to close the week below $17 for the first time in more than two months.