Twitter wins first round in battle with Elon Musk. All eyes on October now

His tweets suggest that Tesla CEO Elon Musk is confident of winning the legal battle against Twitter. But, on Tuesday, the social media company registered its first win as a US court fast-tracked the case with an October trial date.

A judge in the US state of Delaware said the social media company deserved a quick resolution of the deal's uncertainty.

The ruling is a blow to Musk who pushed for a trial in February, which his lawyer told the court would allow for an extensive investigation into the true number of spam accounts on the platform. Twitter had requested a September trial, reported Reuters.

What is the case? Musk, the world’s richest man, had pledged to pay USD 54.20 a share for Twitter, but later backed out of the agreement on June 8, saying that Twitter had failed to provide information about fake accounts on the platform.

Twitter is trying to force the billionaire to stick to the deal and buy the social media company for USD 44 billion. Twitter also wants the deal to happen quickly because it says the ongoing dispute is harming its business.

The Twitter deal: Musk struck a deal to buy Twitter for USD 44 billion on April 26th. Musk had bought a nine per cent stake in Twitter earlier in April, and then offered to buy the whole company outright.

Musk had agreed to pay USD 54.20 for every share of Twitter. "Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated," he said in a statement.

The spam bot issue: Musk has said that the real number of spam bots on Twitter may be four times higher than the company's estimates. Bots are fake accounts not controlled by a person, and can be used on social media to spread misinformation.

Twitter chief executive Parag Agrawal had said that fewer than five per cent of accounts active on any given day at Twitter are bots.

Twitter shares jump: Twitter shares jumped as much as 5.4 per cent after the ruling from the court. They closed up 2.87 per cent at USD 39.49.

From the day Musk tweeted that the deal was "on hold" in mid-May, the stock had fallen as much as 22 per cent, reported Bloomberg.