Musk to pay $1.5 million civil penalty to SEC in X dispute

Elon Musk and the Securities and Exchange Commission reached a settlement Monday over Musk's alleged delay in reporting his stake in the social media platform Twitter before he purchased it in 2022.

The SEC sued Musk last year, alleging he failed to properly disclose his purchase of Twitter stock in 2022, thereby underpaying its investors. He did eventually disclose his stake in April of that year, when he owned more than nine percent of the company.

Musk has agreed to pay a $1.5 million civil penalty, but the settlement still needs sign-off by the judge presiding over the case.

The case's resolution comes as the world's richest man, who owns Tesla, X and SpaceX, is embroiled in another court case in California. The case accuses OpenAI CEO Sam Altman of reneging on his promise to keep the AI lab as a nonprofit.

It also comes after a jury in a federal court in California found in March that Musk misled Twitter investors in the runup to his buyout of the company as part of a separate class action lawsuit, per CNBC. Musk's team is expected to appeal the verdict. 

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.