Spotify CEO Sells Off More Shares Worth $29M

Over the past year, Spotify’s stock has almost doubled in value. This shouldn’t be that surprising since people love their music. Stock prices being driven up not only makes the investors happy, but more importantly, the CEO and co-founder, Daniel Ek, has to be very pleased with himself.

Spotify has done a good job at increasing the number of subscribers, which has helped with the high stock price. But the huge move was Ek’s team had cut back on company costs, which drastically improved profitability for the company. SPOT said in 2024 they experienced their first full year of operating income profitability at $1.52 billion.

Spotify’s premium subscribers grew by 11 million at the end of 2024, ending the year with 263 million of them. They announced that they finished their fourth quarter earnings with a record high of $516.2 million

On Wednesday, March 5th, Ek sold another 50,000 company shares for $29.2 million. Bringing his total earnings to $695.3 million. This is his 15th time selling shares since his first sale in July 2023. That was his largest sale by far, 675,000 shares worth $100 million.

Regardless of these large sales, Ek still remains the largest owner with 14.3% ownership. We also see that his business partner and co-founder Martin Lorentzon has also been following suit with selling shares, earning $556.8 million. Lorentzon still possesses 9.8% ownership.

At the beginning of 2024, Spotify was trading at $187.91 per share. Achieving 154.7% growth in 2024 and carrying that momentum into 2025 with another 40.9% growth so far. In mid-February of 2025, Spotify was trading at a record high of $648.32.