Sources say Musk and Twitter CEO have both postponed pre-trial inquiries or are in settlement negotiations.

According to people familiar with the matter, both Elon Musk, chief executive of Tesla, and Parag Agrawal, chief executive of Twitter, are seeking to reschedule their pre-trial interrogations, sparking speculation that they may be negotiating settlements out of court.

Musk and Agrawal were scheduled to be questioned by each other's lawyers on Monday, local time. Musk's interview was scheduled to begin at 09:30 at a law firm in Wilmington, Delaware, according to court documents. Agravar's inquiry is scheduled to take place at a law firm in San Francisco.

However, Agrawal wants to reschedule his inquiry later this week, according to people familiar with the matter. The exact date has not yet been set. Mr Musk wants to hold inquiries outside Delaware. In general, such inquiries often change the date or place several times for the convenience of the parties to a legal dispute and their lawyers.

Representatives of Twitter and Mr Musk's legal team declined to comment. However, Agravar and Musk suddenly changed the interview date, sparking speculation that the two sides may be engaged in out-of-court settlement negotiations.

The trial of the lawsuit will begin on October 17 and will last for five days. Justice Kathaleen St J. McCormick of the Delaware Court of Chancery must decide whether Mr Musk has any good reason to abandon the $54.20 per share Twitter deal.

Both Musk and Twitter have issued a large number of subpoenas to obtain testimony and other evidence on the number of robots and spam accounts on the latter platform. Musk claimed that Twitter had deceived him about the number of real users of the platform, while the latter claimed it was an excuse for Musk to give up the deal.

Judge McCormick will hold hearings on Tuesday local time on several disputes over the exchange of pre-trial information, such as whether Bruce Falck Falk, who is in charge of Twitter revenue, must testify.