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Jeff Bezos has sold nearly $2 billion in Amazon.com Inc. stock in recent days, according to financial filings released Tuesday.
In pre-arranged sales Friday and Monday, the Amazon founder and chief executive sold 905,456 shares for a total of $1.84 billion, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The sales were timed for just after Amazon reported fourth-quarter earnings Thursday, when it blew away expectations and posted more than $3 billion in quarterly profits.
On Tuesday, Amazon AMZN, +2.27% closed the day with a market cap of more than $1 trillion for the first time, becoming the fourth U.S. company ever to do so, after Apple Inc. AAPL, +3.30% , Microsoft Corp. MSFT, +3.29% and Alphabet Inc. GOOGL, -2.51% GOOG, -2.62% .
Amazon had touched $1 trillion in intraday trading on Friday and again on Monday, but failed to maintain the valuation at the close. It also briefly topped $1 trillion in July and again on Sept. 4, 2018, but fell shy by the end of trading. Market capitalizations are only considered official at the end of the trading day.
In August, Bezos sold nearly $3 billion worth of Amazon stock, just as the e-commerce giant was suffering its worst losing streak in 13 years.
While it is unclear exactly where the money is going, in 2018 Bezos said he’s putting about $1 billion a year of his personal money toward his private space venture, Blue Origin. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index ranks Bezos as the world’s richest individual, worth $127 billion.
Amazon shares are up 24% over the past year, compared to the S&P 500’s SPX, +1.50% 20% gain.
