Musk-Trump Bromance Turns X Debt From Burden to Asset for Morgan Stanley

Once-unloved borrowings now draw buyers on Musk mystique
X financials reveal cost-cut benefits; xAI stake touted

Elon Musk shakes hands with Donald Trump during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Oct. 5.Photographer: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

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By Sridhar Natarajan, Carmen Arroyo, and Reshmi Basu

January 30, 2025 at 5:16 PM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

Just a few months ago, Morgan Stanley was stuck with billions of dollars of unloved debt tied to Elon Musk’s controversial 2022 buyout of social-media platform Twitter Inc. It took one election and a billionaire bromance to flip the script.

Helped by Musk’s singular relationship with President Donald Trump and the tech mogul’s newfound proximity to the White House, Morgan Stanley is discovering that investors are drawn to the debt of the company now called X as it leads banks in marketing a $3 billion offering. Potential buyers who already got a peek at X’s financials are seeing signs of a rebound. And as an added bonus, investors will gain exposure to the company’s stake in Musk’s artificial intelligence project, xAI.