Elon Musk sells another $1 billion of Tesla stock; nearly $10 billion sold this month

In all, Musk has sold about 9.2 million shares worth about $9.85 billion since Nov. 8,  a day after Musk’s Twitter poll decided he should sell 10% of his Tesla stake. Some of the stock sales had been put into motion well before the poll was posted.

Assuming Musk intends to sell 10% of his shares, he’s more than halfway there. Before the sales began, his 10% stake amounted to about 17 million shares — so after Tuesday’s sales, he has about 7.9 million shares to go.

The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that Musk faced a $3.5 billion tax bill on his options, which would have been bigger is Tesla stock hadn’t plunged after he tweeted his plans to sell — saving him about $480 million, according to WSJ calculations.

Barron’s on Tuesday estimated that at his current pace, Musk’s selloff will be done in another four weeks.

Tesla stock TSLA, +0.63% has dropped about 9% since his Twitter poll Nov. 8. Still, the electric-vehicle maker’s shares are up 57% year to date, and up about 100% over the past 12 months.