Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) shares witnessed massive selling from top executives during the month of November. Eight of the top executives at Twitter sold approximately $50 million worth of stock in November, according to Forbes.
Twitter CEO sold 50% of his stake
CEO Dick Costolo sold as much as 50% of his stake. Other executives who sold their shares were Jack Dorsey and Ev Williams. Co-founder EV Williams offloaded $28.7 million worth of shares, however, he still remains the largest individual stakeholder in Twitter.
For the third quarter, revenue growth surged 114% year over year, and profits increased 1%. However, the stock price dropped on the back of weak user engagement metrics and concern about its guidance. The company’s share price has largely remained stable after the decline after the earnings washed off all its gains for the year.
Many senior management executives sold shares during this phase, and the most attractive transaction was completed by Costolo, who sold more than 283,000 shares in his his trusts for around $11.6 million. The CEO still holds stock options for around 8 million shares.
“What I lack in hair and 20/20 vision, I more than make up for in self-confidence,” Costolo told CNBC after the earnings release, adding that the company will become useful and vital to every person on the planet once “we’re successful.”
Other insider selling
Co-founder Ev Williams sold the largest number of shares, offloading 719,193 shares, and gave a stock gift of an additional 376,790 shares last month. Williams is focusing on his blogging platform Medium, which raised $25 million in capital recently. Williams earned $28.7 million from the sales and still sits on the board, controlling approximately 55 million shares or 9.3% of Twitter.
Another co-founder and the most famous one, Jack Dorsey, also sold some shares. Dorsey, who is the head of the payment and transaction app Square, sold Twitter stock worth $2.1 million, which is only a small part of his 22 million share stake.
Various other executives who offloaded shares are Adam Baim (president of global revenues), who sold around $4 million of stock; Alexander Roetter (head of engineering), who sold more than $1 million worth of shares; Vijaya Gadde (general counsel), who sold around $1 million worth of shares; and Kevin Weill (VP of product), who sold just under $1 million worth of stock.
