While Facebook and Twitter are puffing their chest for dealing a decisive blow to the President of the world’s largest democracy, Donald Trump, their shareholders are picking up the pieces.
On Monday, the market capitalisation of Twitter declined by a whopping $5 billion representing a 12 percent stock loss following a weekend in which the social media platform yanked the account – with 89 million followers of the US President from its platform. Facebook, which suspended Trump’s until the handover on 20 January also took a hit as its shares tumbled by 4 percent on Monday.
Although many people, especially members of the Democratic party, financial experts said the decision taken by the social media platforms could potentially hurt their business.
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“Twitter’s got to come up with a new thesis very, very quickly because I think they always, they never talked about the power of Trump in bringing in people,” Jim Cramer, founder of TheStreet and host of MadMoney on CNBC said. “I am telling the real Donald Trump was a great salesperson for Twitter. I think that important there are a lot of people who literally knew that the president was the most important person, and you had to keep checking him, and then you had to check people who talked about him.”
Many political leaders across the world also raised concerns about the role played by Twitter and Facebook. Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, called the decision problematic. She noted that while the action of Trump bothered on fundamental rights, the decision to intervene should not be left to big technology companies to decide.
“This fundamental right can be intervened in, but according to the law and within the framework defined by legislators, not according to a decision by the management of social media platforms,” Steffen Seibert, a spokesperson for Merkel said. “Seen from this angle, the chancellor considers it problematic that the accounts of the US president have now been permanently blocked.”
Criticism also came from Manuel Lopez Obrador, Mexican President who said the ban was a bad sign and could wrongly be interpreted that private companies have the authority to censor opinions.
“I don’t like anybody being censored or taking away from the right to post a message on Twitter or Facebook. I don’t agree with that, I don’t accept that,” Obrador said.
