For context: Musk had some buy options coming due on Tesla stock at something ridiculous like $5. He was always going to take that deal and have to pay some tax

For context: Musk had some buy options coming due on Tesla stock at something ridiculous like $5. He was always going to take that deal and have to pay some taxes on it by selling stock. The reason the tax bill is so high, however, is because he also decided to sell 10% of his total Tesla stock. He came to this decision via a Twitter poll titled "Much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my Tesla stock." Shockingly, only 57.9% of Twitter respondents voted in favor. In any case, he was going to sell some stock no matter what, so this comes off as something of a PR move. I personally think the more effective use of that stock would have been as an endowment towards a charitable foundation.