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Many things are (still) legal. This is how regulations form.. Maybe there should be a new regulation: No major announcements may be made which directly impacts

Many things are (still) legal. This is how regulations form.. Maybe there should be a new regulation: No major announcements may be made which directly impacts stock price X% before X months of the predetermined sales date.

tomas789 6y ago
There are rules like that. For example executives cannot buy/sell stocks of their companies around the major announcements like financial results. Most of the time internal compliance department just sets a windows in which it is safe to do such transactions. As for the announcements one usually has to announce before the transaction is made (again compliance reasons) but then you don’t want to wait because the price tends to move against you with such announcements. This is why the real trades were likely executed just seconds after the announcement.
kortilla 6y ago
There is no way to know what percentage an announcement will move a stock. Additionally, given that executives schedule stock sales all year long (most of their comp is stock), that effectively means no announcements can ever be made.
codetrotter 6y ago
But in that case, should Pfizer wait an additional x amount of days before they announce the vaccine just because the CEO had a sell order planned? That wouldn’t be great for the world either I think. Or how did you mean?
- devdas 6y ago
  Execute the sale, then make the announcement.
  - kgwgk 6y ago
    Then if the trial was a flop he would be selling just in time to avoid the subsequent drop in price.
devdas 6y ago
No, even better would be to trigger a revaluation of all stock values on that date, and tax the income (as normal income, not capital gains) as if 100% of their stock was sold at that price. So if you hold 100 million shares valued at 1 USD/share, and sell 1 million at 2 USD/share, your tax liability will be assumed on you selling 100 million shares at 2 USD/share (or 200 million of regular income).
- SpelingBeeChamp 6y ago
  Next time you use an illustrative example, I suggest using the simplest figures you can. With respect to your example, it's exactly the same point and IMO easier to follow if you remove all instances of the word "million."

tomas789 6y ago

There are rules like that. For example executives cannot buy/sell stocks of their companies around the major announcements like financial results. Most of the time internal compliance department just sets a windows in which it is safe to do such transactions. As for the announcements one usually has to announce before the transaction is made (again compliance reasons) but then you don’t want to wait because the price tends to move against you with such announcements. This is why the real trades were likely executed just seconds after the announcement.

kortilla 6y ago

There is no way to know what percentage an announcement will move a stock. Additionally, given that executives schedule stock sales all year long (most of their comp is stock), that effectively means no announcements can ever be made.

codetrotter 6y ago

But in that case, should Pfizer wait an additional x amount of days before they announce the vaccine just because the CEO had a sell order planned? That wouldn’t be great for the world either I think. Or how did you mean?

devdas 6y ago
Execute the sale, then make the announcement.
- kgwgk 6y ago
  Then if the trial was a flop he would be selling just in time to avoid the subsequent drop in price.

devdas 6y ago

No, even better would be to trigger a revaluation of all stock values on that date, and tax the income (as normal income, not capital gains) as if 100% of their stock was sold at that price. So if you hold 100 million shares valued at 1 USD/share, and sell 1 million at 2 USD/share, your tax liability will be assumed on you selling 100 million shares at 2 USD/share (or 200 million of regular income).

SpelingBeeChamp 6y ago
Next time you use an illustrative example, I suggest using the simplest figures you can. With respect to your example, it's exactly the same point and IMO easier to follow if you remove all instances of the word "million."