By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – Tesla stock (NASDAQ:TSLA) traded nearly 4% lower in Friday’s premarket as it attempted to absorb impact of another sale of shares by the company’s Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk.
The billionaire offloaded 934,091 more shares for $1.05 billion in the latest exercise, according to regulatory filings posted late Tuesday, bringing his sale of the company’s equity to 9.2 million and worth about $9.9 billion.
The sales happened after Musk exercised his option to buy 2.15 million shares of the company. Tesla’s outstanding equity base comprises 1 billion shares.
The maverick CEO has sold Tesla shares in several tranches since he conducted a Twitter (NYSE:TWTR) poll November 7 asking whether he should sell 10% of his holding. The latest sales imply that Musk has crossed the halfway mark of his plan to sell 10% of his stake in the company.
While Musk made it look like he would be directed by popular opinion – which eventually favored him selling the stake – he needed money to pay a large tax bill on his newly acquired Tesla stock. Most likely, he will be left with a surplus after paying his taxes.
To reach the 10% threshold that he mentioned in his Tweet, Musk would need to sell some 17 million shares, or about 1.7% of the company’s outstanding stock. If his exercisable options are factored into his overall ownership, he’ll need to sell even more, according to Bloomberg.