Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) CEO Elon Musk sold a further 934,091 shares of the automotive company at a value of $1.05 billion after exercising options to acquire 2.15 billion shares, according to U.S. securities filings.
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The sale started after Musk’s early November Twitter poll in which the majority of participants backed his plans to sell 10% of his stake at the electric car manufacturer. The stunt raised the eyebrows of some analysts back then.
As reported, Elon Musk has already sold more than half of that 10% to cover tax payments. According to Reuters, the businessman –and the richest person in the world– has already disposed of 9.2 million shares for a value of $9.9 billion, more than half of what was raised.
After a few days off, he has sold 934,091 shares worth $1.05 billion according to documents published Tuesday by the market regulator. He has exercised options on another 2.15 million shares, so the sales serve him to cover the taxes for this second operation.
In total, Musk would have to sell about 17 million shares to meet his goal of selling 10%, something with which he intends to silence politicians who ask millionaires to pay more taxes in the U.S.
“Already Planned”
Elon Musk has exercised millions of options since the Twitter poll was closed, all of them still months ahead of their expiration.
In September, he announced a prearranged stock trading plan to carry out “an orderly sale related to the exercise of stock options,” according to official documentation –senior managers have to explain these plans to the regulator and establish a timetable.
The Twitter poll did not reveal the existence of such a plan, so Musk was asking users for something that was already partly decided.
The South African businessman is the richest person in the world. At 50, he amasses a wealth of $303.7 billion according to Bloomberg. Tesla is part of the Entrepreneur Index, which tracks 60 of the largest publicly traded companies managed by their founders or their founders’ families.
