MicroStrategy Insider Sales Hint Executives May Lack CEO’s Conviction
Insiders at MicroStrategy, the US-based software company led by vocal bitcoin (BTC) proponent Michael Saylor, may not be as bullish on the number one cryptocurrency as the CEO himself, new filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) suggests.
As first reported by Bloomberg, the filings showed that MicroStrategy’s Chief Financial Officer Le Phong and Chief Technology Officer Timothy Lang have both sold shares of the company by exercising about 30% of the stock options awarded to them. The sale, which occurred in August, after bitcoin’s all-time highs in the spring, reportedly brought in gains of about USD 7m for each of the executives.
Meanwhile, the CEO himself has not sold any shares, the filings showed.
And while Saylor remains a huge bitcoin bull, with his company holding approximately BTC 108,992 worth over USD 5bn at current prices, the insider sales show that others in the company may not be as convinced as the CEO.
Commenting on the news on Wednesday, Matt Maley, Chief Market Strategist at institutional trading firm Miller Tabak + Co., was quoted by Bloomberg as saying that the sale, in his view, is “a bad sign”:
“Senior executives do not sell stock if they think it’s going higher. It’s just a bad sign no matter how you slice it,” the market strategist said.
He also suggested that some on Wall Street are becoming concerned that Saylor is sacrificing his company’s core business for his laser focus on bitcoin.
However, the view was not shared by everyone, with for instance Ed Moya, senior market analyst at brokerage firm Oanda, quoted in the same report as saying that MicroStrategy is already “a cryptocurrency trade and not necessarily a bet on the company’s software solutions and services,” adding that MicroStrategy’s stock price will “continue to go the direction of Saylor and his bet on Bitcoin.”
At 08:24 UTC, the price of bitcoin was up 4.2% for the past 24 hours to trade at USD 46,571. The gains today followed a sharp sell-off on Tuesday, causing bitcoin to lose nearly USD 10k before recovering some of the losses. Meanwhile, MicroStrategy’s share price has also traded lower since this week’s market crash, falling by 7.3% on Tuesday and 1.6% Wednesday.
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Learn more:
– MicroStrategy Spends Another USD 177M on Bitcoin
– Bitcoin Mega Bull MicroStrategy CEO Gives Hope To Ethereum, Altcoins
– MicroStrategy Has No Limits For Bitcoin Purchases, Discusses Sale Scenarios
– Fed May Have Indirectly Invested In MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin Drive
