Earlier quoted context omitted.
That isn't how it works unfortunately. If the shares vest during the blackout period they're only released to the employee, or former employee, once the blackout ends. The employees can't sell these until the blackout is lifted. Currently there is no end date set.
I would think someone would be happy to lend you the number of shares you have blacked out for a large fee, with a contract you release that to the lender afterwards. Something like "we lend you 75% face of your blackout shares now, in return we get all your blackout shares when they're released." Edit: Per below comment, don't do this :)
Twitter Layoff Started Today
251–260 of 355 posts
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#252Almost no information here or anywhere else. Any other source? What roles? How many? Edit: 30% of its recruiting team: https://www.wsj.com/articles/twitter-lays-off-third-of-talen...
WSJ has a piece on it. A third of the talent team, which affects fewer than 100. https://www.wsj.com/articles/twitter-lays-off-third-of-talen...
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#253Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can't take out a 401k loan if you don't work there any more. In fact, that's one of the major drawbacks of 401k loans. If you leave employment, you have to repay the loan within a set time period, or treat it as a disbursement. That said I agree, complaints about "what will happen when my severance runs out!" did elicit a bit of an eye roll.
I'd never heard that... can you roll it over into an IRA and take a loan against that?
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#254“ many of these folks won’t be able to sell the shares they earned. The money they need pay bills and keep them afloat if and until they get new employment. When severance ends, that’s it.” It’s Twitter’s responsibility to not only offer severance, but make sure employees keep an emergency fund?
I mean, Twitter is keeping them from liquidating the shares that they already own and have vested. It's easy to imagine that keeping savings in shares of a company as opposed to cash is reasonable. How screwed would most people be if the stock exchanges all closed down and they were fired?
That's false, someone commented to that effect in the response thread on LinkedIn. Blackout periods for insider trading reasons can't apply to you if you're no longer with the company and you own the shares. It's possible their broker fucked up and has some snafus, but it is not legally possible for them to prevent you from selling shares after you've been fired.
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#255Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would think someone would be happy to lend you the number of shares you have blacked out for a large fee, with a contract you release that to the lender afterwards. Something like "we lend you 75% face of your blackout shares now, in return we get all your blackout shares when they're released." Edit: Per below comment, don't do this :)
Most of these anti-insider trading policies prevent all of the obvious "one clever tricks" by prohibiting entering into options contracts, lending, borrowing, shorting, executing futures transactions, etc. If you could find someone to lend you cash (based on the totality of your financial situation and personal credit), that's fine. It's not fine to borrow someone else's shares and short them during a blackout.
If you have MNPI you can't buy or sell anything, including stocks or options, even if you don't work for the company.
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#256Earlier quoted context omitted.
Regular folks are not insiders. You can certainly pledge collateral for a loan.
I don’t recall what the terms were for TWTR but I do know my current employer prohibits using these shares as collateral for a loan, because you may default and be forced to sell them in the blackout period.
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#257My understanding was that this sort of stock sale blackout is typically an internal thing to avoid insider trading liability, but if you've been laid off, you would no longer be internal and therefore no longer subject to the blackout. Is that not how it's structured here?
That's how it worked last time I left a publicly traded company during a blackout period.
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#258The legend was, they had a fake fire drill. Then when everyone was out in the parking lot, they told certain people not to bother coming back in again.
Edit: Snopes has a "debunking" of this at [1]. I'm not persuaded that this debunks it, since the laws protecting employees were not in effect yet way back then.
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#259Earlier quoted context omitted.
> “Working class” lol. Class-wise, engineers are like the junior executives in the Mad Men era, or junior lawyers and bankers today. They are not only well compensated, but have tons of impact (and therefore leverage) as individual contributors. Anyone who relies on wage labor for their income (as opposed to earnings from capital) is working class. That is the defining feature of the working class. Unless you could r…
> Anyone who relies on wage labor for their income (as opposed to earnings from capital) is working class. Since when is that the definition? Doctors and lawyers have never been considered part of the "working class." Software engineers, and other categories of jobs that didn't really exist in the 1930s, are more similar to those professionals than to working class people. > People love to erode class solidarity by c…
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_class#Marxist_definiti...
Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today
#260“ many of these folks won’t be able to sell the shares they earned. The money they need pay bills and keep them afloat if and until they get new employment. When severance ends, that’s it.” It’s Twitter’s responsibility to not only offer severance, but make sure employees keep an emergency fund?
Aren't vested shares in a public company just shares? Once they're no longer employees, they shouldn't be subject to any trading blackout.