Tesla (TSLA) shares are up 6% after Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Elon Musk bought nearly $1 billion U.S. worth of company stock.
It was Musk’s first purchase of Tesla stock on the open market since February 2020.
Musk bought 2.57 million shares of Tesla stock for close to $1 billion U.S., a sizable insider purchase that investors are treating as a vote of confidence in the electric vehicle maker from its CEO.
Stock purchases by Elon Muck are extremely rare. He last bought about 200,000 Tesla shares worth $10 million U.S. on February 14, 2020, which was Valentine’s Day.
Until now, the 2020 purchase had been the largest ever Tesla stock buy from Musk, who owns about 15% of Tesla.
However, the majority of Musk’s Tesla stock holdings were awarded to him as compensation.
The latest stock purchase comes after shareholders recently approved a new pay package for Musk that could be worth up to $1 trillion U.S. based on Tesla meeting future milestones.
Prior to today, TSLA stock had risen 4% on the year to trade at $395.94 U.S. per share. The stock has risen more than 25% over the last three months.
