Spotify's stock is surging — and its CEO is cashing out

• Spotify CEO Daniel Ek has sold $176.3 million worth of stock this year.
• The company's shares have leaped 60% year to date.

Daniel Ek, Spotify's cofounder and CEO, has sold $176.3 million worth of his stock in the streaming service this year as its shares continue to surge.

On Wednesday, Ek sold roughly 400,000 shares, worth $118.8 million, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. In a separate transaction in February, he sold 250,000 shares, worth $57.5 million, per filings.

The sales come as Spotify's stock has grown substantially in recent months — to the tune of roughly 60% year to date.

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The company reported record profitability last quarter — though Ek acknowledged that Spotify underestimated the impact of laying off 1,500 people in December (as part of 2,500 in total cuts in 2023).

Ek is one of many prominent business execs offloading shares amid explosive growth. As of February, Jeff Bezos, Jamie Dimon, and Mark Zuckerberg had sold stock in their respective companies, worth about $9 billion — as shares of Amazon, JPMorgan, and Meta ballooned.

And Ek — who famously hasn't taken a salary since 2017 — also isn't the only Spotify exec selling shares this year. Fortune noted that other members of Spotify's C-suite, plus its former chief financial officer Paul Vogel, had also sold tens of millions of dollars in stock this year.

Spotify did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.