Update Nov. 10, 2021, 10pm PT: New SEC filings have revealed Musk has sold nearly $5 billion in Tesla shares this week–read more here. Our original story follows below.
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Tesla CEO Elon Musk followed through on this Twitter poll, when he asked if he should sell 10% of his shares in the company.
According to Form 4 filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, it was revealed Musk exercised over 2.15 million stock options, at a price of $6.24 per share, reports Bloomberg.
“The shares of common stock were sold solely to satisfy the reporting person’s tax withholding obligations related to the exercise of stock options to purchase 2,154,572 shares,” the filing reads.
Musk sold 676,812 Tesla shares on November 8, worth over $750 million, according to the Form 4 filing shared by @SawyerMerritt.
According to SEC laws, an S-4 form must be filed within two business days of transaction dates when company insiders sell shares. Many were expecting a form to materialize on Wednesday, and here we are today.
BREAKING: Tesla has filed a 2nd Form 4 tonight with the SEC, showing Elon Musk sold 676,812 $TSLA shares worth over $750M. The sale took place on Nov 8th. pic.twitter.com/pEeqm9EFWZ
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) November 10, 2021
The Tesla CEO selling shares is to help pay the combined taxes on his stock options gains. Musk doesn’t receive a salary from Tesla or SpaceX, instead has his compensation in the form of stock rewards.
Much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my Tesla stock.
Do you support this?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 6, 2021
On November 6, Musk asked Twitter, “much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my Tesla stock,” asking people to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no’ on whether or not they supported the idea. Nearly 58% of the 3.5 million votes cast favoured ‘yes’, and since then Tesla’s stock dipped 16% in two days, but has recovered somewhat on Wednesday.
After hours, Tesla shares are up 2.63%.
