Mark Zuckerberg has been selling Facebook shares almost every business day since November 9, 2020. For the preceding 12 months the Facebook CEO had not sold a single share.

Market estimates indicate that the world's fifth richest person has reportedly sold around 94 lakh shares valued at $2.8 billion during the eight months until July 2021. Zuckerberg kept $200 million (post-tax) out of the proceeds for himself.

Net Worth

The 37-year-old's estimated wealth is around $127 billion and 98 percent is in his Facebook stockholding. The rest comes from his real estate investments in Palo Alto, California, Hawaii and Lake Tahoe.

Since 2016, when his stake was valued at $45 billion, Zuckerberg and his philanthropic and advocacy organisation Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) has sold over 13.2 crore shares of the social media giant, worth nearly $15 billion. He had kept around $2.1 billion after taxes, Forbes estimates.

Pledge

Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan had promised to donate 99 percent of their Facebook shares for education and developing cures for various diseases.

In 2018, Zuckerberg and CZI sold shares worth $5.3 billion.

Philanthropy

Filings to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) indicate that around 90 percent of the total stock sold recently was by CZI.

In November 2019, Zuckerberg stopped share sales and CZI made a donation of $60 million (through 2.04 lakh shares) to the Silicon Valley Community Foundation (SVCF), a California based non-profit organisation. In 2018, the couple donated nearly $2 billion worth of shares to SVCF.

CZI was given $2.9 billion in grants and has invested $150 million in for-profit ventures since 2015, according to its website. It works in areas such as technology, science, education, community, inclusive growth and justice for humanity, among others.

The advocacy group gave $17.8 million to leftist election related initiatives since 2018 and sold 1.03 lakh remaining shares towards the end of 2020.

Rationale

A CZI spokesperson declined to give an explanation but said the stock sale was through the Rule 10b5-1 plans of the SEC, which allows business executives to sell shares regularly. And that it was a common practice among those who owned a large number of shares in listed companies.

In 2016, Chan announced that CZI would donate $3 billion in the next 10 years to help cure all diseases.

Current Holding

Zuckerberg now owns only 14 percent stake in Facebook, which is half of his 28 percent holding at the time of its IPO in May 2012. At that time his net worth was valued at $16.9 billion. Its current market price is eight times plus of what it was during the IPO. Since March 2020, the share price has more than doubled in 17 months.

First Published:Jul 23, 2021 5:35 PM IST