One of Facebook's directors and largest investors, Peter Thiel, revealed to Business Week the reason why the social network's discussions of its proposed $500 million autumn deal with Twitter fell through - it was Facebook's inaccurate and illiquid stock assessment, which was not appealing enough to Twitter!

Saying that the two companies could not arrive at a consensus about either the price or the composition of the company, Thiel said: "It became pretty clear it wasn't going to happen. The deal would have to be done with Facebook stock. And then you have to figure out how much the stock is worth."

With the price question down to the value being paid in Facebook stock, the social network - based on its own valuation of $8-9 billion - offered $100m in cash and the rest in stock, and unsurprisingly Twitter drew back.

As the idea of a $500 million deal tempted the Twitter, it agreed to go ahead with it on one condition - that the Facebook stock it was to receive should be valued at the price company shares earned on the open market. That certainly was not acceptable to Facebook, and, thus, the deal fizzled out!

However, despite its botched attempt to takeover the microblogging site Twitter, Facebook still is bent upon growing amid the ongoing recession, and is on the lookout for other acquisitions.