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Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

nytimes.com

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Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#11

Post by djloche »

Here is the takeway:

"Mr. Rowghani has been selling Twitter shares heavily since May, when insiders were first allowed to sell after the company’s initial public offering in November.

Last month, he sold 300,000 shares, worth about $10 million. And this month, he sold nearly 75,000 shares worth more than $2.5 million. He remains a major stockholder, however, owning about two million shares, according to his latest regulatory filing."

This is a non-story. This is a guy that had a mountain of net-worth 'on paper' and since he is now legally able to, he's brought a portion of that net-worth into the bank.

I don't know about you, but if I had 50MM+ on paper in a single investment, I'd want to take at least a fifth of it and turn it into cash for investing elsewhere, building that dream home, going on vacation, etc.

Now, maybe he's filthy rich already, but this just strikes me as a very typical, sane 'diversify your assets' type of situation.

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#12

Post by k-mcgrady »

rmason wrote: post #7

I adore Twitter but I am afraid the company is executing poorly. Here are a few examples: 1. I receive daily emails on my main account urging me to advertise. Or more properly I don't see them because I've marked them as spam. 2. Created an account for an event that never got used. Receive two emails every single day trying to get me to engage. You would think after over a year that they'd get the message I wasn't go…

>> "1. I receive daily emails on my main account urging me to advertise. Or more properly I don't see them because I've marked them as spam."

Me too! I used their ad service once and despite telling them not to send anymore emails I get bombarded with marketing emails every single day.

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#14

Post by gvr »

therobot24 wrote: post #6
mantrax5 wrote: post #5

Reminds me of Forstall who dumped all his Apple stock months before being fired. Why should they dump their stock before being fired? Is there a reason not to wait a little bit? It just looks plenty passive-aggressive. Unless, of course they believe the stock will take a nosedive shortly after (which never happens).

absolve ties?

Yeah, Jobs did the same thing. There are plenty of people that feel they want to get that psychological tumor out of their lives after being fired and I think it's understandable even if it's not entirely rational in all cases. I'd probably do the same myself.

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#15

Post by dmcy22 »

valarauca1 wrote: post #3

>Twitter had 255 million monthly users in March, a 5 percent increase from the previous quarter. It was the second quarter of disappointing growth for the service, and Wall Street was hoping for an increase in the double digits. Growing at a rate of 12.5 million users per quarter is slow?

Not a direct comparison, but when Whatsapp is adding 1 million users a day [1], 12.5 million per quarter doesn't seem like that much.

[1] http://money.cnn.com/2014/02/20/technology/social/whatsapp-1...

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#16

Post by JonFish85 »

djloche wrote: post #11

Here is the takeway: "Mr. Rowghani has been selling Twitter shares heavily since May, when insiders were first allowed to sell after the company’s initial public offering in November. Last month, he sold 300,000 shares, worth about $10 million. And this month, he sold nearly 75,000 shares worth more than $2.5 million. He remains a major stockholder, however, owning about two million shares, according to his latest re…

My personal take on this is that the company is desperate to seem confident in the future. If the executives sell stock, the employees sell, and suddenly there'd be a large-scale sell-off, I think. My guess would be that the executives are holding onto it to try to infuse some sense of stability for now, but they'll start looking for the exits shortly, and when they leave, they'll liquidate their holdings.

I think you're spot on with your analysis, but I think it hurts the image of Twitter executives holding their stock because they're confident that it'll continue to go up.

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#17

Post by ForHackernews »

yalogin wrote: post #13

Whats going on with Twitter? The stock is significantly down and they seem to be going through re-orgs frequently. Have they become stagnant? Its not going to go away but I don't know what else they can do to increase revenue or increase adoption.

Honestly, I've never understood the appeal of Twitter. Maybe many other people feel similarly?

I read somewhere that the vast majority of Twitter accounts are bots or completely inactive.

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#18

Post by thesis »

djloche wrote: post #11

Here is the takeway: "Mr. Rowghani has been selling Twitter shares heavily since May, when insiders were first allowed to sell after the company’s initial public offering in November. Last month, he sold 300,000 shares, worth about $10 million. And this month, he sold nearly 75,000 shares worth more than $2.5 million. He remains a major stockholder, however, owning about two million shares, according to his latest re…

Correct. Sheryl Sandberg has been dumping stock recently as well. http://www.businessinsider.com/sheryl-sandberg-sells-152m-of...

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#19

Post by _pmf_ »

djloche wrote: post #11

Here is the takeway: "Mr. Rowghani has been selling Twitter shares heavily since May, when insiders were first allowed to sell after the company’s initial public offering in November. Last month, he sold 300,000 shares, worth about $10 million. And this month, he sold nearly 75,000 shares worth more than $2.5 million. He remains a major stockholder, however, owning about two million shares, according to his latest re…

> Last month, he sold 300,000 shares, worth about $10 million. And this month, he sold nearly 75,000 shares worth more than $2.5 million.

A clever man.

Re: Twitter’s Chief Operating Officer Steps Down

#20

Post by rsfinn »

mantrax5 wrote: post #5

Reminds me of Forstall who dumped all his Apple stock months before being fired. Why should they dump their stock before being fired? Is there a reason not to wait a little bit? It just looks plenty passive-aggressive. Unless, of course they believe the stock will take a nosedive shortly after (which never happens).

Kara Swisher reports[1] that his intent in selling stock was to raise money to donate to medical research:

There was, in fact, a question at a recent “tea time” — bi-weekly employee meetings with top execs — about Rowghani’s large sale of his shares. Those in attendance told me that Rowghani got up and told the audience that he was not thrilled to answer the question, but noted that he wanted the money to give to research to battle a disease that took his father’s life. It was an emotional address, said those present.

[1] http://recode.net/2014/06/11/twitter-mulling-shake-up-of-top...

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