Key points
- Nebius's operating chief filed to sell 500,000 shares
- The sale runs under a trading plan set up in May
- The filing says it's the plan's last sale
Ophir Nave, the chief operating officer and a board member of Nebius (NBIS), filed to sell 500,000 shares on Oct. 5, according to a Form 144 that shows up on our insider selling tracker. The filing put the shares at $121.4 million, which works out to $242.81 each, Nebius's closing price on Oct. 2.
A sale that size gets noticed. What made me read the whole filing, though, was a note at the bottom of it.
What does the filing say about the plan?
Nave adopted the Rule 10b5-1 plan on May 22, 2026, 136 days before the proposed Oct. 5 sale. If you want the longer version of how these plans work, I wrote a whole piece on them.
The filing's remarks say the 500,000 shares represent about 17% of the equity Nebius has granted him, adding: "No further sales will be made under such trading plan." The filing identifies this as the final sale under that plan. It doesn't rule out sales under a future plan.
The shares came from restricted stock units that vested between Nov. 30, 2024, and Aug. 31, 2026. Morgan Stanley Smith Barney is handling the sale.
Where did Nebius stock go?
Nebius closed at $232.57 on Oct. 5, the day of the planned sale, down 4.2% from its Oct. 2 close. It rebounded on Oct. 6 and traded at $252.39 at 11:59 a.m. Eastern, up 8.5%. The proposed sale represents about 0.2% of the outstanding shares listed in the filing. The notice doesn't establish whether the sale contributed to the Oct. 5 decline.
What don't we know yet?
A Form 144 is a notice of a planned sale, so the $121.4 million is an estimate. Nave's Form 4 will show how many shares he actually sold and at what prices. If the sale occurred on Oct. 5, the usual two-business-day Form 4 deadline would be Oct. 7. I'll be watching for it.
