On Monday, the company’s share price fell as much as 7.5% in premarket trading as investors prepared for the upcoming Musk’s proposed sale of about a tenth of his Tesla holdings following a Twitter poll.
On Saturday, Elon Musk tweeted that he considers selling 10% of his stock if Twitter users approve the proposal. 3.5 million users engaged in the voting process, and 57.9% of people voted “Yes.” The poll came after Musk said he would exercise many stock options in the next three months, which would create a hefty tax bill.
Musk’s poll follows a US Senate Democrats tax proposal to tax billionaires’ stocks and other tradeable assets to finance Joe Biden’s social spending agenda. Moreover, a loophole that has allowed billionaires to defer capital gains taxes indefinitely will be closed.
According to Refinitiv Eikon data, in the three months to Nov 4, company insiders sold $ 259.62 million worth of shares.
Despite Musk’s enthusiasm, investors will also be waiting for a response from regulators. The US Security and Exchange Commission has ordered Tesla to vet any public communications-type material Musk made on the EV maker.
In Europe, Tesla’s Frankfurt-listed shares fell about 9%.
Sources: reuters.com, theguardian.com