Twitter management is not incompetent, Musk set his own price.
He should definitely pay a fine.
You can't walk into a situation and cause major chaos - literally executive turnover, stock going crazy, all sorts of turmoil - and then walk away on bad faith and excuses.
Also - he does not have unlimited resources. He literally cannot afford this deal right now.
He practically bought it; it's unlikely an agency or third party to intervene / object; only thing to "save" him is stating he doesn't have the monwy/funding was pulled due to lack of information. Even then, I doubt he would avoid it.
Of course they can drag each other to the bottom until one gives up. I doubt Musk will and Twitter might have existential issues if it doesn't get bought with rumors related to their user base quality.
The user base quality thing, irrespective of what the real answer is, is mostly a canard. The only way it could possibly get used is by Musk in the public commons to trash them.
Other than that, this will be a side-show court battle now, unless one party has reason to continue arguing about it in public sphere.
He should definitely pay a fine.
You can't walk into a situation and cause major chaos - literally executive turnover, stock going crazy, all sorts of turmoil - and then walk away on bad faith and excuses.
Also - he does not have unlimited resources. He literally cannot afford this deal right now.