Elon Musk: Owning Twitter has been a "rollercoaster"

The Twitter application on a digital device [Gregory Bull, AP]

Twitter Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk now says he only bought the platform because he had to, while describing owning the social media firm as 'quite painful and a rollercoaster'.

Musk, who granted a last-minute interview to BBC at the Twitter headquarters on Wednesday, reiterated that he has no plans for selling the company even if he got an offer matching what he paid for it. He also added that, presently, the company is roughly breaking even, although he didn't back his statement.

During the interview at Twitter HQ in San Francisco, the billionaire who is also the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX also stated that he wanted to pay less for Twitter after discovering more automated bots on the network.

He also touched on the mass lay-offs at the firm stating that it was down to 1,500 staff members from an initial 8,000.

Musk also revealed that Twitter is currently working on clamping down on misinformation following the rise of hate speech on the platform while calling for regulating Artificial Intelligence to ensure the safety of users.

In April 2022, Musk became Twitter's largest shareholder with a 9.2% stake in the social media company.