Life is good for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) CEO Jeff Bezos. If he’s not living your wildest dream as an intergalactic bureaucrat who went boldly where no one has gone before, he’s making a killing at the stock market, expanding his already impressive track record. And with that, the Amazon executive is earning more money than your average developing country.
For three months in a row, Bezos has unloaded $1.4 billion in Amazon stock. Just last week, he successfully sold another 1 million Amazon stock, valued at a staggering $756.74 million, according to a regulatory filing.
In May, Bezos was able to sell more than one million shares of the company stock, which is worth a cool $671.29 million. During last week’s mind-bending deal, the average stock price was about 13% higher than when the prolific investor sold off his shares in May. He made so much money off his stocks that his net worth broke records, according to the regulatory filing. With his latest sales, he was able to add $2.6 billion to his fortunes.
According to GeekWire, the filing notes that the sale was made in agreement to a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. This rule allows company insiders to sell a “predetermined amount of stock at a set time” to avoid the appearance of inside trading.
Amazon has benefitted from Bezos’ strategic cunning, with share price continuing to climb. The online retail giant has performed well in several strong quarters, exceeding Wall Street expectations when the company’s stock price rose to more than 45% over the last year. Just recently, Amazon was able to surge ahead of Exxon Mobil, becoming the fourth most valuable company in the country, according to market cap.
Bezos recently landed the third spot on Forbes’ list of the richest people in the world, surpassing Warren Buffet. With a net worth of $66.1 billion, Bezos is just one spot away from Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates ($78.5 billion) and Zara co-founder Amancio Ortega ($75.5 billion) on the Forbes’ list.
Bezos’ sales represent the largest amount that the executive ever sold, primarily because of the higher share price. The Amazon founder has closed off megadeals in recent years, including a $534 million deal in August last year for more than a million shares. In February 2014, he also closed a deal worth $351 million. In May 2010, he sold 2 million shares valued at $265 million. According to records, Bezos owns more than $80.9 million Amazon shares at Monday’s closing price.
Bezos founded the online retail store, one of the largest in the world, in 1994. The company announced a revenue of $30.4 billion and adjusted profit per share of $1.78, versus just 19 cents per share a year earlier. Since Bezos’ string of successful deals, Amazon’s shares have gained 2% from the last results and 14% over the past 3 months.
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