The approval follows an intense get-out-the-vote marketing campaign and comes simply three days earlier than Fact Social’s Sept. 8 liquidation deadline. A failure of the vote would have required the SPAC to dissolve and return $300 million to shareholders, depriving Trump Media & Expertise Group of funds from the deal.
The corporate should nonetheless meet closing situations earlier than the merger could be formally acknowledged. The Securities and Trade Fee mentioned in July that Digital World had misled buyers in official paperwork filed for the merger course of. The SPAC might want to right these inaccuracies and resubmit the filings earlier than the merger course of can resume. The SPAC additionally has not filed required quarterly monetary statements with the SEC protecting its operations through the first half of 2023.
Digital World mentioned in filings linked to its preliminary public providing in September 2021 that the merger proceedings would in all probability take a few yr. However it has confronted a sequence of hurdles requiring it to hunt deadline extensions with shareholders’ assist. The corporate additionally sought a one-year deadline extension in September 2022.
Digital World shares climbed to greater than $18 on the information Tuesday morning, however pared some features to $16.80 a share at 11 a.m. The inventory peaked in 2021 at about $175 a share.
Eric Swider, Digital World’s chief govt, mentioned in a Fact Social put up Tuesday morning: “Thanks for all the excellent assist. Please perceive my silence. We stay centered on the duty at hand and are watching each phrase we are saying.”
Trump provided no instant remark. Swider and representatives of Trump Media didn’t reply to requests for remark.