Elon Musk is reportedly laying the groundwork for an investment trading hub that would operate on the X platform – taking a step closer toward realizing his vision of turning the site once known as Twitter into a one-stop shop “everything app.”
The billionaire tech mogul is asking a financial data company to build the stock trading hub inside X, according to a report by the news site Semafor.
“Real-time information is a powerful force, especially in the world of investing,” X wrote in its pitch to several financial data firms who would be tasked with developing a platform offering real-time information on stock movements and other content.
X is looking to entice companies by offering them a chance to gain exposure to “hundreds of millions of highly-qualified users,” according to the pitch which was obtained by Semafor.
But X is not offering any payment to the companies, according to Semafor.
Instead, companies will have to pony up their own funds if they hope to take part in the project, according to Semafor.
Musk on Thursday denied the report.
“No work is being done on this to the best of my knowledge,” he wrote on X.
Musk, who bought what was then Twitter for $44 billion last fall, has spoken in the past about transforming X into an app that would emulate WeChat in China.
WeChat, the platform owned by Chinese tech unicorn Tencent, has an estimated user base of nearly 1.4 billion people – which is nearly all of the country’s population.
Through WeChat, Chinese nationals can message, voice and video call, connect on social media, order food delivery, make mobile payments, play games, read the news, and even meeting others for dates.
But critics note that while Musk bought Twitter to restore its free speech-inspired mission, WeChat is often cited as an app that allows the Chinese government to track the behavior of its citizens.
After acquiring Twitter last year, Musk stated that the deal was “an accelerant to creating X, the everything app.”
The “Grab” app in Singapore and Japan’s “Line” app are similar “everything” platforms that have been praised by Musk in the past.