Are Musk and Twitter Back On? Here’s What We Know.

The legislation companies representing Musk and Twitter on deal work and litigation stand to earn tons of of thousands and thousands for his or her months of labor, in line with estimates from rivals and colleagues accustomed to the matter. The companies declined to remark.

The deal was at all times prone to be a lawyer’s dream, fee-wise. Whereas Musk’s bid got here collectively comparatively rapidly this spring, the talks quickly grew to become mired in prolonged authorized wrangling, resulting in many billable hours. “There’s loads of discovery to do,” Peter Glennon, a authorized skilled, informed The American Lawyer in August. “We aren’t simply taking a look at emails. We’re taking a look at Slacks, Groups, texts, all of it.” (John Espresso, a Columbia legislation professor, beforehand estimated that authorized charges may have run to $1 billion.)

The important thing gamers:

• Musk is represented by Skadden on the deal aspect and by Skadden and Quinn Emanuel in litigation. Prime companions on the companies invoice about $2,000 an hour. Attorneys estimated to DealBook that the companies could possibly be charging about $30,000 to $40,000 an hour, or $5 million to $8 million a month. Which means Musk may have paid about $50 million, plus maybe one other $50 million within the run-up to litigation.

• Twitter relied on Wilson Sonsini and Simpson Thacher, the place prime companions additionally most definitely invoice about $2,000 an hour, for deal work. And for litigation it’s primarily counting on Wachtell, the blue-chip agency recognized in authorized circles for its bespoke (and opaque) pricing, together with hourly billing, flat charges and contingency offers. Relying on its preparations, Wachtell may usher in $100 million to $200 million, attorneys estimate.

Between these companies alone, the Twitter case has in all probability already generated about $150 million to $300 million in charges. However then add in the entire different attorneys concerned in litigation, depositions, the deal and extra. And that determine may develop if this truly goes to trial, or in any other case goes awry.

Ray Dalio bids goodbye

Ray Dalio, the outspoken and oddly earnest hedge fund supervisor whose profile rose after he predicted the 2008 monetary disaster, is relinquishing control of Bridgewater Associates, the agency he based out of his two-bedroom condo in 1975. In an extended deliberate transition, the co-C.E.O.s, Nir Bar Dea and Mark Bertolini, will run Bridgewater, now the world’s largest hedge fund, with $150 billion in managed property.

Dalio ushered within the period of huge hedge funds. By the point Bridgewater began its signature Pure Alpha fund in 1991, most rivals had been comparatively small, targeted on the inventory market and managing the cash of the ultrarich. Dalio, whose experience was in foreign money buying and selling, sought enterprise from pension funds, which had enormous piles of cash to take a position and had been in search of publicity exterior the inventory market.