The good news for Dennis “Chip” Wilson, chairman of Lululemon Athletica, is that he pocketed $50 million just before the Vancouver company’s stock price tanked this week.
The bad news is, the California-born surfer who became a billionaire in part by founding Lululemon a dozen years ago took a paper loss of $600 million on the rest of his position in the yoga clothing empire.
Wilson sold off roughly 600,000 shares last Friday. On Monday, chief executive Christine Day made the surprise announcement she will be stepping down. The company’s share price lost about a fifth of it’s value on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Shares in Lululemon appeared to be gaining back some ground on Thursday.
The stock sale followed a series of transactions since May 21 that netted him another $62.5 million, according to the Vancouver Sun.
None of the trades, however, will draw the ire of regulators, it seems. Each was part of a prearranged plan that Wilson notified the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in December would take place, reducing his stake in the company by 4 per cent.
Wilson, who stepped down from active duty in the company early last year, remains the company’s single biggest shareholder and has a net worth of approximately $2.9 billion – down from $3.5 billion on Monday mind you.
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