Facebook Inc (FB) Insiders Unload Shares

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Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) Chief Financial Officer David Ebersman sold off more than 200,000 shares of the social network’s stock last week at a price of around $38 each, according to regulatory filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That leaves him with almost 2.1 million shares of Facebook. He’s not the only insider at the network who has sold the stock recently though.

Facebook Inc (FB) Insiders Unload Shares

Facebook still shares soaring on earnings

Facebook shares have been on a tear since the company’s most recent earnings report, soaring 50 percent since it was released. Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster raised his price target on the stock today to $39.06 per share.

Today the stock is up another 3 percent, and while it has topped the initial public offering price of $38 per share, it has yet to reach the opening day price of $45 per share. Nonetheless, Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) executives have been busily selling off their shares.

Facebook’s insiders are intensively selling

Seeking Alpha contributor Markus Aarnio spotted what he calls “intensive insider selling.” The three criteria for intensive insiders selling are: at least three insiders sold shares in a month, no insiders bought shares and at least two insiders lowered their holdings by more than 10 percent.

In addition to Ebersman’s sale of Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) shares, Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg also sold shares as part of her trading plan. Other insiders who sold the stock during July include Engineering Vice President Michael Schroepfer, General Counsel Colin Stretch, Chief Accounting Officer Jas Athwal and Marketing Vice President David Fischer. All of the sales listed in the Seeking Alpha indicate that they were part of the executives’ pre-arranged trading plans.

LinkedIn executives also selling shares

Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) wasn’t the only social network with insiders selling off shares. A number of insiders at LinkedIn Corp (NYSE:LNKD), which also went on a tear after its earnings report, also sold off their shares in July. Aarnio counted nine insiders of the network selling shares during July. Chief Executive Officer Jeff Weiner was among those selling. Since they sold in July, it means that they got out before the stock price went through the roof. The price hovered below and just above the $200 per share mark for most of July before rocketing up over $230 per share on Friday.

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