Zuckerberg Sells $95 Million In Facebook Stock For Philanthropic Organization

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, have started to make good on their pledge to give away 99% of their wealth to public-interest causes. On Wednesday and Thursday, the couple’s two vehicles for charitable giving and impact investing—the Chan Zuckerberg Foundation and CZI Holdings LLC—sold Facebook shares worth nearly $95 million before taxes, according to a regulatory filing on Friday.

The sales likely netted more than $85 million after capital gains taxes, which CZI Holdings must pay because it is a limited liability company rather than a nonprofit foundation.
The couple announced their plans to give 99% of their Facebook shares to social causes in a Facebook post in December, the same month their daughter, Max, was born. At the time, their stock holdings were worth $45 billion.

To fulfill their pledge, the pair formed the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, which intends to fund charities, companies and policies that “advance human potential and promote equality.” The organization will initially focus on improving education, curing disease, and strengthening communities, according to its website. The venture’s first investment, in June 2016, was in Andela, a startup that trains African engineers for jobs in the tech industry. Zuckerberg’s spokesperson declined to specify what the cash netted in this week’s transactions will fund.

The couple plans to sell or give away no more than $1 billion-worth of stock each year through 2018, according to the regulatory filing.
FORBES estimates that Zuckerberg has a fortune worth $53.3 billion.