Interesting article… thoughts are welcome!
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/skechers-ceo-sells-74-million-…
Earthshine, see this post by Chamonyx: http://discussion.fool.com/as-i-just-posted-on-rb-if-you-look-he…
- Matt
2 Likes
It’s all nonsense. Shorts jumped in after earnings and now they are trying to push the price down.
Here’s the link from Yahoo Finance, showing that every share the CEO sold was from an option grant that was converted when it matured and he sold on conversion. There were no change in his actual position.
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/it?s=SKX+Insider+Transactions
Here’s the same thing from OpenInsider in case you think that Yahoo isn’t telling the truth.
http://openinsider.com/search?q=skx
And here’s a nice one from Oracle: If you click at the end of the line where it says “see Txns” (transactions), it shows very, VERY, clearly that ALL the sales were from conversion of options and they say very explicitly that there was no change in his position.
http://www.form4oracle.com/company/skechers-usa-inc-skx?id=4…
It’s all normal for any rapidly growing company. Junior executives at Amazon probably sell almost as much…
Saul
14 Likes
showing that every share the CEO sold was from an option grant that was converted when it matured and he sold on conversion. There were no change in his actual position.
Hi Saul,
Actually, there was a change in his position.
Those weren’t options he sold, they were Class B shares held by his family trust that were converted to (publicly traded) Class A shares at a 1-for-1 ratio and then sold on the open market or in a private transaction.
See Footnotes 1 and 3 on the Form 4s as filed with the SEC:
• Aug 19: http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1065837/0001209191150…
• Sep 25: http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1065837/0001209191150…
As a result, while his direct holdings of Class A shares remained the same at 74,231 shares, his indirect holdings of Class B shares went down from 4,443,836 to 3,944,636, a drop of 11% or so.
Source documents beat aggregator websites every time.
In case someone here doesn’t know how, to find these filings, go here – http://www.sec.gov/edgar/searchedgar/companysearch.html – and type the ticker into the search box to get the company’s filings, then click the “Include” radio button for ownership filings and hit enter or click the Search or Show All button to get the Form 4s to show up. Also, there’s this “how to read a Form 4” Fool wiki page which I wrote: http://wiki.fool.com/Form_4
Jim
28 Likes
Those weren’t options he sold, they were Class B shares held by his family trust that were converted to (publicly traded) Class A shares at a 1-for-1 ratio and then sold on the open market or in a private transaction.
Thanks Jim — You know, if he had 4,500,000 shares at $150 each, he just may have decided he didn’t need six hundred and seventy-five million dollars all tied up in one stock (and sold off the seventy-five). I certainly would have.
Saul
4 Likes
He probably just needed some “pocket change” for his next vacation 
With insider sales, think about these shares as if they were part of an investment portfolio. Just because you work for or run a company doesn’t mean its the safest decision to have a massive % of your net worth tied to it, especially if there is a public market for it.
Also, its a part of your compensation. If I were in that position I’d sell most of them as soon as I got them too.
How many on the board are comfortable have more than 10%, 25%, or 50% tied to one stock? Some at 10% for sure, not many up higher.
Why should anyone expect someone who runs a company to treat their ownership % any differently than how a rational person would allocate a portfolio?
3 Likes