Known for his outlandish statements, eccentric billionaire and new Twitter owner Elon Musk also said he is “going to buy McDonald’s and fix all the ice cream machines”.
After rocking one of the world’s most prominent social media platforms and snatching Twitter for $44 billion in a bizarrely hostile takeover on Monday, billionaire Tesla founder Elon Musk announced a new target: Coca-Cola. In yet another cynical tweet, newfound Twitter owner Musk said today that he plans to buy Coca-Cola “to bring back cocaine.”
Soon after, Musk posted a screenshot of a previous tweet in which he said, “Now I’m going to buy McDonald’s and fix all the ice cream machines,” and jokingly replied to himself “Listen, I can’t fix miracles. “.
Known for his outlandish statements, Musk’s reputation on Twitter precedes him — and he did so before he bought the company. Musk has, in the past, polled Twitter users asking whether he should sell 10% of his Tesla stock to pay off an unrealized capital gain, after which he actually invested about $7 in Tesla shares. Billion sales, when over 57% of the poll participants voted in favor of his suggestion.
In the weeks before his Twitter acquisition, when Musk was set to join only the board and nothing else, the Tesla founder tweeted a series of ideas he believed could improve the platform. Yes, some appeared serious — like the possibility of introducing an edit button — while others looked downright bizarre, like turning Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters into a homeless shelter.
His most recent Coca-Cola tweet—possibly in jest, though his history of revealing cynical social media statements isn’t fully understood—is a nod to the colorful history of the beverage company seasoned with cocaine. Coca-Cola’s trademark soft drink is named for its two primary ingredients: coca leaves and kola nuts. While kola nuts are a source of caffeine, coca leaves are the base from which the psychoactive drug cocaine is derived.
Cocaine-laden coca leaves used to be an integral part of the formulation of carbonated soft drinks, in the nineteenth century when the substance was still considered medicinal. However, as the drug became stigmatized and Prohibition hit America, cocaine was dropped from the secret formula of Coca-Cola and replaced with coca leaves instead.