Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.com, has continued his selling spree by unloading another 12 million shares of Amazon, valued at $2 billion.
This latest transaction is his third tranche in just a month, taking the total value of Amazon shares sold by him to over $6 billion. This series of sales are part of a trading plan initiated by the company in November.
The company had also earlier announced that Bezos was planning to offload up to 50 million shares of Amazon through the year. Bezos' holding in Amazon is now down to 952.26 million shares from 976.25 million shares earlier.
Here's why bezos is selling amazon shares
The timing of also coincides with Bezos' announcement of relocating to Miami from Seattle. This move to Florida likely saves Bezos approximately $430 million in taxes, as Washington state has recently implemented a 7 per cent levy on capital gains, while Florida has no such tax.
Bezos's fortune is estimated by Forbes at $195.5 billion, making him the third richest man on the planet, behind Frenchman Bernard Arnault, CEO of the LVMH group and Elon Musk, the boss at Tesla, Twitter and SpaceX.
Amazon most recently released financial results February 1, which far exceeded expectations.
The tech behemoth achieved a sales turnover of $170 billion and a net profit of $10.6 billion, driven by faster deliveries and a particularly successful holiday season.
Also Read: Vedanta Group company, Sterlite Technologies slashes salaries by 15-25% after layoffs