Twitter shares drop after Trump account ban

Twitter shares dropped Monday after it permanently suspended the account of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Fred Katayama reports.

Shares of Twitter dropped 11% in early trading Monday, knocking more than $3 billion off its market value.

Some investors dumped their shares after the social media company suspended President Donald Trump’s popular account on Friday, citing the risk of further violence after he helped provoke a riot at the Capitol.

Some Republicans cried foul.

Traders pointed to signs that the social media shutout of Trump was further fueling calls to tighten regulation on Big Tech.

The European Union commissioner Thierry Breton compared the storming of the Capitol to the global crackdown on terrorism after the 9-11 attacks, writing in POLITICO, “The fact that a CEO can pull the plug on POTUS’s loudspeaker without any checks and balances is perplexing.” Other tech giants such as Facebook, Google, Apple and Amazon have also taken their strongest actions against Trump to limit his reach.

Their shares also declined Monday, but not by as much as Twitter’s.

Trump had more than 88 million followers on Twitter, and analysts say many of those “eyeballs” will go away if Trump is permanently banned.

Investors will also keep an eye on downtown San Francisco Monday amid reports that local police were bracing for a possible protest by pro-Trump supporters outside Twitter’s headquarters.