Bloomberg - Evening Briefing - Fired by accident

Twitter is heading into its second full workweek under Elon Musk with only half of its workforce (he fired the other half), mounting losses and a growing number of reversals to the billionaire’s plans. Musk fired close to 3,700 people on Friday, only for the company to then reach out to dozens of them he apparently fired by mistake. Musk also fired more than 90% of his staff in India. And his stated goal of adding verification checkmarks for members of the platform’s monthly subscription service is being delayed. The whiplash has of course managed to keep Twitter, and Musk, in the news—though not necessarily in the best of lights, seeing as his new $44 billion baby is hemorrhaging $4 million a day. —Natasha Solo-Lyons

Mastodon, an open-source social network that markets itself as an alternative to Twitter, has seen a surge in new sign-ups in recent days, overwhelming the site and its founder as the tiny operation struggles to keep up. Since Musk took over Twitter on Oct. 27, Mastodon has drawn close to half a million new users, bringing total monthly active users to more than 1 million. But that’s a tiny fraction compared to Twitter’s 238 million daily active users. 

Photographer: NurPhoto/NurPhoto

Musk told his followers on the eve of US midterm elections to vote Republican. Polls indicate Democrats—despite near-record employment and the Supreme Court’s elimination of federal abortion rights—are poised for losses amid stubborn inflation and new restrictions on voting access imposed in GOP-controlled states.

Goldman Sachs’s top economist said there’s still a “very plausible” path for the US economy to avoid a recession despite the Federal Reserve’s aggressive tightening of interest rates and geopolitical uncertainties.

US shares rose in a broad-based rally that swept up small caps as well as blue-chip stocks, ahead of the midterms and inflation data later this week. The dollar fell with Treasuries. Here’s your markets wrap.

Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta is planning to begin firing potentially thousands of workers starting this week, according to a report. The job cuts could come as early as Wednesday.

Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

Republican lawmakers have made little secret of their disdain for TikTok amid concerns about the Chinese government’s influence over the social-media app. But Jeff Yass, one of the biggest benefactors of the GOP, owns about 7% of TikTok parent ByteDance. 

Investors should stay bullish on equities ahead of this week’s US midterm elections, according to Morgan Stanley’s Michael Wilson, the top-ranked strategist who correctly predicted this year’s slump in stocks.

Bloomberg continues to track the global coronavirus pandemic. Click here for daily updates.

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The Powerball jackpot is expected to hit a record $1.9 billion for Monday’s drawing, making it the biggest lottery prize ever offered. If someone wins, they’ll have the option of taking home either a $929.1 million lump-sum payout or 30 annual payments averaging $63.3 million each. Both those options are subject to federal taxes, plus state and local taxes where applicable. The difference in state tax rates—ranging from nothing in places like California and Florida to 10.9% in New York—has some prospective winners questioning whether they can play location arbitrage by buying a ticket in a no-tax state.

Photographer: Carla Gottgens/Bloomberg

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