> Do they just simply wait until the stock is at a high point, and sell a lot? Maybe move that money to other investments? Pretty much. If they own shares in a

> Do they just simply wait until the stock is at a high point, and sell a lot? Maybe move that money to other investments? Pretty much. If they own shares in a public company, they can just sell them on the open market. You can see director's dealings on the company's 'Insider Transactions': (i.e. Apple: http://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AAPL/holders?p=AAPL http://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AAPL/holders?p=AAPL) If the company's not public — they can receive cash through salary/bonus/dividends. If they're privately financed (i.e. VC's) they can liquidate some of their shares during a funding round (they sell some of their shares to the VC). (This is a total ELI5 — sorry to any financiers/accounts reading this)