BREAKING NEWS: Elon Musk snaps up $3bn Twitter stake and sends share price soaring

Tesla boss Elon Musk has taken a 9.2% stake in Twitter, a week after hinting about plans to shake up the social media platform.

Twitter shares spiked up more than 25 per cent in pre-market trading, after a regulatory statement issued on Monday, April 4, on Musk buying the stake.

Musk, 50, polled his more than 80 million followers on Twitter last month, asking them whether the company adheres to the principles of free speech.

After more than 70 per cent responded in the negative, he asked whether a new platform was needed and said he was giving serious thought to starting his own platform. 

Musk has has regularly run into trouble on the social media platform

The Tesla chief executive officer is seeking to exit a 2018 deal with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission which limits his Twitter posts about the electric car maker. 

Elon Musk, a co-founder of Tesla, is the richest person in the world with a net worth of $273 billion.

He bought 73,486,938 Twitter shares on 14 March, according to the Securities and Exchange Commission.