“Not good because Twitter has $1 billion in cash. So I’ve spent the last five weeks cutting costs like crazy,” Elon Musk told Twitter Spaces, a feature on the platform he has purchased for $44 billion.

Elon Musk said on Wednesday that drastic cost cuts at Twitter had mended the company’s ailing finances as he set out to find a new CEO for his struggling social media platform. The Billionaire said on a live chat that without the changes, including laying off more than half of Twitter’s employees, the company would have wasted $3 billion a year.

“Not good because Twitter has $1 billion in cash. So I’ve spent the last five weeks cutting costs like crazy. Whether… You’re looking at it from my point of view… you’re basically in a plane flying at high speed towards the ground with the engines running and the controls not working” he told. Just weeks after his acquisition of Twitter, Mr Musk laid off around half of his 7,500 employees, sparking concerns that the company did not have enough staff to handle content moderation and scare off governments and advertisers.

Elon Musk said his strategy was paying off and that by massively cutting costs and increasing subscriber revenue, “I now think Twitter will do well next year” and break even. He added that he understands advertisers are sceptical about spending on his platform but attribute their caution to the poor economic outlook rather than concerns about content moderation.

He said the new $8 subscription service, called Twitter Blue, would help make up the difference.

“Because if not, how are we going to pay the damn server bill,” Musk said, adding that Twitter hardware costs about $1.5 billion a year.

Mr Musk defended his policy after tweeting that he was looking for a rather “dumb” new CEO to replace him. He said he would then limit his responsibilities to managing Twitter’s software and server teams.

This was followed by a Twitter poll in which Elon Musk asked users if he should remain CEO of the company – with 57% of votes saying he should step down. Mr Musk has used Twitter polls to make other decisions on the platform, including restoring former US President Donald Trump’s account.