Elon made deals w/ hedge funds to funnel him money as they shorted the stock (not to mention 100x leverage derivatives against TSLA). Because Twitter is collateralized against his wonder-child.
Since canceling his PR team, Elon's entire MO has been to run it into the ground in a manner that seems plausible to the SEC so he doesn't get out-right sued.
He just isn't this stupid, whether you want him to be or not.
"Fuck you" to his advertisers seems like a fairly on-brand way to telegraph his true intentions. I really look forward to a point where we can forget about his relevance when all 3 companies bite the dust.
Since twitter is no longer publicly traded, he doesn't have to make anything "seem plausible" to the SEC... So the premise of your theory needs some work.
I can shutter my private company whenever I want for whatever reason I want. If the private investors have an issue w/ that, they can sue me.
This has nothing to do with the SEC.
Market manipulation? There are no shares on the market to manipulate. This is WHY companies choose to go private... So that they are no longer beholden to the public shareholders and the regulatory bodies that exist to protect them (the SEC)
Whether he intends it or not, it's going to die when it turns into a far right outrage echo chamber. The only people willing to advertise will be outright scammers. There's a reason why every right wing alternative platform fails. They also tend to fail to attract normies with moderate conservative beliefs. If they do get them, they leave after the userbase reveals itself to be a bunch of racist incels.
Eh... They would have lost money as he bought Twitter for more than it was worth and once he bought it the edge funds were forced to close their positions as Twitter wasn't on the market anymore.
Unless you're talking about shorting Tesla in which case sure, but that's Elon's piggy bank, so that wouldn't make much sense.