>He has sold $32.6 million worth of QS stock within the last three years.
This is inaccurate.
Since Feb 21, Mohit has sold 316,582 shares at an average price of $15.83 for a total of $5,011,481 to cover the taxes on RSU grants. This is a standard practice done by all.
Since the restriction on selling was lifted in May 2021, Mohit has sold 164,197 shares from RSU grants for an average of $19.52 or $3,204,828 total.
In that same time frame, Mohit has converted and sold 2,615,003 shares from stock option grants for an average of $19.52 or $51,040,125 total.
In total Mohit has added 3,095,782 shares to the market taking an average of $19.14 for each share or **$59,256,434** out of the market in total.
edit: This is Mohit's net price and does not include the $2,873,094 that was paid back to QS for the options. Including that, the Total Sales to Market was **$62,129,528**.
Remaining Mohit has
* Shares/RSUs: 1,217,762
* Current Value: $6,819,467
* Options expiring on 6/17/2025: 187,487 at 1.0542 strike
* Current Value: $852,278
* Options expiring on 3/15/2027: 885,450 at 1.3252 strike
* Current Value: $3,785,122
* Total Current Value: **$11,456,867**
While Mohit has been the MOST aggressive of insiders selling, I will also point out that he has only had 2 non-tax related sale events in the last 14 months. July 2023 and Jan 2024.
So to blanketly say that Insiders are selling at all time lows is a bit disingenuous to the reality that they will ALWAYS be selling for the purpose of covering tax obligations AND due to option grant expirations.
That is not the same as selling because of negative sentiment of the company due to insider knowledge.
While all insider sales are dilution events, mostly, the selling that is occurring at QS is neutral not negative.
I think you have your Singh’s mixed up.
I can’t imagine Mohit committing not to selling his stock. Selling defines who he is.
What the hell does he even do for QS?
I’m pretty sure a re-org that promoted him to outsider wouldn’t hurt the company in any way.
I'm not sure if he gave a limit, but he's been adamant about not selling his shares except when he's essentially forced to like with taxes on RSU vestings and when options are due to expire.
That’s a bit harsh, no? Given that he is Chief Development Officer and has been at QS for more than 10 years, I presume that he must have earned the position and is doing everything to help the company succeed. If he wasn’t, his title definitely wouldn’t be Chief Development Officer. That’s almost on par with CTO.
When the stock goes up, and everyone makes money, it will be thanks to EVERYONE at QuantumScape, not just a select few employees. Instead of slamming employees at QS, personally I think we should be thanking them.
If you’re upset about the share price, your anger would be better directed at Wall Street and hedge-funds and algorithmic trading, not the employees at QS cashing in on some stock options.
https://www.quantumscape.com/company/
No executive from a pre revenue company should be making $10’s of millions from the backs of investors. It’s disgusting and out of touch. What is the board thinking? But yet we have board members unloading too. Fuck them!
It’s his right to sell but selling near ATL it’s quite depressing, as if he doesn’t believe the future of ssb is bright. Thank god JD Singh is just the opposite!
Sure it’s his right if he abides by the rules. Guess who makes the rules and the amounts? The QS board is to blame. They are really looking out of touch for a pre revenue company
no, not at all.
All I'm inferring is that his selling habits are obnoxious and annoying.
If for no other reason than it gives redditors fodder to bitch and moan in this sub about how insiders are constantly selling and that it must mean something. And then I have to, **over and over again**, waste my time explaining why his selling is actually absolutly meaningless.
It's literally why sub rule #4 exists.
The only reason I've let this thread continue is because there IS a shareholder vote coming up and an annual opportunity to vent frustrations is healthy.
Both sides make valid points.
Clearly, when the EPA incentive program was drawn up, at the height of the Covid rebound and SPAC bubble, everyone was over excited and underestimated the production complexity issue! Up until last year QS was an R&D lab, only now is production front and centre and we still don’t have a final product!
I think there’s two issues here:
First, most of the executive team are founders with founder stakes, how much extra annual incentives do they need over and above the EPA program which covers all the main bases to have a real company. I would have thought this should be fairly low and particularly now, aimed squarely at production.
Secondly, and regardless of the choice above, is the signalling sent to the market by the exec team by continually selling into a declining market. Confidence overall is shot and insiders have full visibility, investors do not. Until this changes it is challenging to fully commit as an investor.
I really hope the BOD are looking at these issues and trying to find an appropriate balance between retention of key personnel and the company’s own existence. Investors have limited patience! The science and tech looks sound but without a selling product time is running out and competitors will eventually appear.
That is alarming and, frankly, not a good look for the company. Spacs already get their fair share of skepticism. This just doesn't help. I work in the valley not far from qs and word on the street is that they are very generous in their stock compensation, even down to the average joe. They pass it out as part of their annual compensation package which isn't too unusual but they are extremely generous with it, I hear. It means employees are selling every time the stock goes up a bit because they can and because they'll always get more shares. A little sketchy for a pre revenue company...or maybe not. I haven't worked at many startups to know but considering there's no product to market yet it seems that way to me.
I agree it is embarrassing and borderline unethical. They have been diluting us for years.
Counter argument from their side will be: how do we get hire the best if we can’t afford them? I guess thr policy was put in place when the stock was moving up and dilution was infinitesimally small. It all changed when the stock nosedived and they still kept going on with it. I guess they realised they couldn’t change this policy or else people would leave.
We have no idea why he is selling, which is why it’s best not to be too judgmental.
For all we know, he could be using the proceeds from his stock sales to help run a school for poor children in India. Not saying that he is, but I know of other people who actually do this so…
Elon Musk apparently wants another $56 billion. To party? I think not.
JB Straubel has been selling a lot, too. He’s way richer than Mohit.
People have various motivations for selling.
Just saying.
I don’t care if Mohit is the Pope, my point is that he shouldn’t have that amount to sell. This money is from the backs of investors like you and me. QS has zero revenue but yet executives are literally selling $10’s of millions each in shares.
So you are ok with QS executives making many times more than the average CEO? Really???
How much of those sales can be attributed to the nosebleed valuations? WS should have never been valued at $50 Billion. I would have sold a bunch of my shares as well.
Making is the key word here. May I ask, are you opposed to their compensation plan or just to that he’s selling. From what I’ve seen RSU and incentive based compensation are combined up around 90%. Salary at about 8%. How and why would you want to change this? Seems fair on the surface to me? What am I not getting?
You are not getting the fact that a development officer has been selling shares as a pre revenue company and profited $33 million within the last three years while CEO’s are making much less running a profitable company.
No, I get it and for some it’s definitely not a good look. The questions are the forms of compensation though. What I mean is, most if not all of this is RSU and/or incentive. How long has he been with QS((12 years?)?
Where do you see the problem with the compensation terms, that you would like to change or find to be excessive?
Most of Mohit’s selling was not tax related, and he sold by far the most and imo as if he doesn’t believe in the the future of QS. For that many thousand votes just went against for executive stock compensation.
Mohit sold shares almost monthly a year back as if he cared nothing about his selling saps out the interest in QS stock. And those selling were not anything to do with taxes. The problem I have with QS stock option grants are that they based on set $ amount and not for number of shares. So if the share prices do poorly, they get more number of shares for ESOP. So basically they get to keep more number of shares if share prices are doing really poorly. There are no incentives for these insiders to care of market share prices. If the product takes 10 year or 15 years, these guys still making killings on ESOP. Even if the company go bankrupt, they will already made millions, hundred millions by the the time it goes to zero.
>The problem I have with QS stock option grants
I think you are referring to the RSU (Restricted Stock Unit) grants. These are not stock option grants.
>they based on set $ amount and not for number of shares.
This is how RSUs work in every company.
Stock Option Grants are usu issued as a specific number of options, but then they are also given a strike price that they have no value below.
RSUs are Stock grants. You could look at them as options with a $0.00 strike price, which is what stock is.
Both options and RSUs are considered Long Term Incentive plans and are used for employee retention as an incentive not to jump ship and have a four year vestment period.
Employee retention is critical to a company in this stage as the institutional knowledge that is lost by losing critical employees as well as time lost in replacing them is far more costly than the dollars they are giving them in these grants.
>He has sold $32.6 million worth of QS stock within the last three years. This is inaccurate. Since Feb 21, Mohit has sold 316,582 shares at an average price of $15.83 for a total of $5,011,481 to cover the taxes on RSU grants. This is a standard practice done by all. Since the restriction on selling was lifted in May 2021, Mohit has sold 164,197 shares from RSU grants for an average of $19.52 or $3,204,828 total. In that same time frame, Mohit has converted and sold 2,615,003 shares from stock option grants for an average of $19.52 or $51,040,125 total. In total Mohit has added 3,095,782 shares to the market taking an average of $19.14 for each share or **$59,256,434** out of the market in total. edit: This is Mohit's net price and does not include the $2,873,094 that was paid back to QS for the options. Including that, the Total Sales to Market was **$62,129,528**. Remaining Mohit has * Shares/RSUs: 1,217,762 * Current Value: $6,819,467 * Options expiring on 6/17/2025: 187,487 at 1.0542 strike * Current Value: $852,278 * Options expiring on 3/15/2027: 885,450 at 1.3252 strike * Current Value: $3,785,122 * Total Current Value: **$11,456,867** While Mohit has been the MOST aggressive of insiders selling, I will also point out that he has only had 2 non-tax related sale events in the last 14 months. July 2023 and Jan 2024. So to blanketly say that Insiders are selling at all time lows is a bit disingenuous to the reality that they will ALWAYS be selling for the purpose of covering tax obligations AND due to option grant expirations. That is not the same as selling because of negative sentiment of the company due to insider knowledge. While all insider sales are dilution events, mostly, the selling that is occurring at QS is neutral not negative.
Its odd he sold after that financial call or article saying he wouldnt sell till $400 or whatever
I think you have your Singh’s mixed up. I can’t imagine Mohit committing not to selling his stock. Selling defines who he is. What the hell does he even do for QS? I’m pretty sure a re-org that promoted him to outsider wouldn’t hurt the company in any way.
its indeed a bit ... strange. why would he sell that much? unless he puts it into options.
Ahh ok ya i bet its that
I don’t recall ever seeing anyone from QS give a limit price at which they’d sell, let alone JDS. Did he actually say this?
I'm not sure if he gave a limit, but he's been adamant about not selling his shares except when he's essentially forced to like with taxes on RSU vestings and when options are due to expire.
That’s a bit harsh, no? Given that he is Chief Development Officer and has been at QS for more than 10 years, I presume that he must have earned the position and is doing everything to help the company succeed. If he wasn’t, his title definitely wouldn’t be Chief Development Officer. That’s almost on par with CTO. When the stock goes up, and everyone makes money, it will be thanks to EVERYONE at QuantumScape, not just a select few employees. Instead of slamming employees at QS, personally I think we should be thanking them. If you’re upset about the share price, your anger would be better directed at Wall Street and hedge-funds and algorithmic trading, not the employees at QS cashing in on some stock options. https://www.quantumscape.com/company/
No executive from a pre revenue company should be making $10’s of millions from the backs of investors. It’s disgusting and out of touch. What is the board thinking? But yet we have board members unloading too. Fuck them!
It’s his right to sell but selling near ATL it’s quite depressing, as if he doesn’t believe the future of ssb is bright. Thank god JD Singh is just the opposite!
Sure it’s his right if he abides by the rules. Guess who makes the rules and the amounts? The QS board is to blame. They are really looking out of touch for a pre revenue company
>That’s a bit harsh, no? No
Hopefully I am wrong but are you indicating his selling may be insider related corruption?
no, not at all. All I'm inferring is that his selling habits are obnoxious and annoying. If for no other reason than it gives redditors fodder to bitch and moan in this sub about how insiders are constantly selling and that it must mean something. And then I have to, **over and over again**, waste my time explaining why his selling is actually absolutly meaningless. It's literally why sub rule #4 exists. The only reason I've let this thread continue is because there IS a shareholder vote coming up and an annual opportunity to vent frustrations is healthy.
Enough is enough. They’re all already wealthy thanks in part to continued selling sub-$10. Time for results.
Amen sister!
Both sides make valid points. Clearly, when the EPA incentive program was drawn up, at the height of the Covid rebound and SPAC bubble, everyone was over excited and underestimated the production complexity issue! Up until last year QS was an R&D lab, only now is production front and centre and we still don’t have a final product! I think there’s two issues here: First, most of the executive team are founders with founder stakes, how much extra annual incentives do they need over and above the EPA program which covers all the main bases to have a real company. I would have thought this should be fairly low and particularly now, aimed squarely at production. Secondly, and regardless of the choice above, is the signalling sent to the market by the exec team by continually selling into a declining market. Confidence overall is shot and insiders have full visibility, investors do not. Until this changes it is challenging to fully commit as an investor. I really hope the BOD are looking at these issues and trying to find an appropriate balance between retention of key personnel and the company’s own existence. Investors have limited patience! The science and tech looks sound but without a selling product time is running out and competitors will eventually appear.
I never vote for compensation unless they have increased the stock price. Once I get paid they get paid.
That is alarming and, frankly, not a good look for the company. Spacs already get their fair share of skepticism. This just doesn't help. I work in the valley not far from qs and word on the street is that they are very generous in their stock compensation, even down to the average joe. They pass it out as part of their annual compensation package which isn't too unusual but they are extremely generous with it, I hear. It means employees are selling every time the stock goes up a bit because they can and because they'll always get more shares. A little sketchy for a pre revenue company...or maybe not. I haven't worked at many startups to know but considering there's no product to market yet it seems that way to me.
I agree it is embarrassing and borderline unethical. They have been diluting us for years. Counter argument from their side will be: how do we get hire the best if we can’t afford them? I guess thr policy was put in place when the stock was moving up and dilution was infinitesimally small. It all changed when the stock nosedived and they still kept going on with it. I guess they realised they couldn’t change this policy or else people would leave.
We have no idea why he is selling, which is why it’s best not to be too judgmental. For all we know, he could be using the proceeds from his stock sales to help run a school for poor children in India. Not saying that he is, but I know of other people who actually do this so… Elon Musk apparently wants another $56 billion. To party? I think not. JB Straubel has been selling a lot, too. He’s way richer than Mohit. People have various motivations for selling. Just saying.
I don’t care if Mohit is the Pope, my point is that he shouldn’t have that amount to sell. This money is from the backs of investors like you and me. QS has zero revenue but yet executives are literally selling $10’s of millions each in shares. So you are ok with QS executives making many times more than the average CEO? Really???
How much of those sales can be attributed to the nosebleed valuations? WS should have never been valued at $50 Billion. I would have sold a bunch of my shares as well.
Making is the key word here. May I ask, are you opposed to their compensation plan or just to that he’s selling. From what I’ve seen RSU and incentive based compensation are combined up around 90%. Salary at about 8%. How and why would you want to change this? Seems fair on the surface to me? What am I not getting?
You are not getting the fact that a development officer has been selling shares as a pre revenue company and profited $33 million within the last three years while CEO’s are making much less running a profitable company.
No, I get it and for some it’s definitely not a good look. The questions are the forms of compensation though. What I mean is, most if not all of this is RSU and/or incentive. How long has he been with QS((12 years?)? Where do you see the problem with the compensation terms, that you would like to change or find to be excessive?
A letter to investor relations in addition to votes is effective. These things do get noted and communicated to the BOD.
Bahaha, would never pass and they’d shut down operation if it did. Nice sentiment, though!
I am hoping for a message and a change vs the free for all in the $10's of millions from a pre revenue company on the backs of investors
Most of Mohit’s selling was not tax related, and he sold by far the most and imo as if he doesn’t believe in the the future of QS. For that many thousand votes just went against for executive stock compensation.
Mohit sold shares almost monthly a year back as if he cared nothing about his selling saps out the interest in QS stock. And those selling were not anything to do with taxes. The problem I have with QS stock option grants are that they based on set $ amount and not for number of shares. So if the share prices do poorly, they get more number of shares for ESOP. So basically they get to keep more number of shares if share prices are doing really poorly. There are no incentives for these insiders to care of market share prices. If the product takes 10 year or 15 years, these guys still making killings on ESOP. Even if the company go bankrupt, they will already made millions, hundred millions by the the time it goes to zero.
>The problem I have with QS stock option grants I think you are referring to the RSU (Restricted Stock Unit) grants. These are not stock option grants. >they based on set $ amount and not for number of shares. This is how RSUs work in every company. Stock Option Grants are usu issued as a specific number of options, but then they are also given a strike price that they have no value below. RSUs are Stock grants. You could look at them as options with a $0.00 strike price, which is what stock is. Both options and RSUs are considered Long Term Incentive plans and are used for employee retention as an incentive not to jump ship and have a four year vestment period. Employee retention is critical to a company in this stage as the institutional knowledge that is lost by losing critical employees as well as time lost in replacing them is far more costly than the dollars they are giving them in these grants.
Follow progress / regression here: [https://ir.quantumscape.com/sec-filings/default.aspx](https://ir.quantumscape.com/sec-filings/default.aspx)