The president of Tencent Holdings, Asia’s most valuable listed company, has sold 1mn of his shares in the company at a premium of 5.4% to yesterday’s closing market price, according to a regulatory filing.
Martin Lau sold the shares in Tencent, whose stock more than doubled in value in 2017, at an average price of HK$434.36 ($55.35) apiece, reducing his stake to 0.48% from 0.49%, the stock exchange statement said.
The sale comes after Tencent’s largest shareholder, Naspers Inc, last week sold a 2% stake for $9.8bn, the first time in 17 years it had reduced its stake.
Tencent lost more than $51bn in market value in two days last week on news of Naspers’ share sale and also management’s warning of margin pressure.
The plunge came despite the company reporting better-than-expected profits.
Its shares closed 4.63% lower at HK$412.2 yesterday, lagging a 2.5% drop in the benchmark Hang Seng Index.
The fall sent Tencent out of the club of companies valued at more than $500bn, though with a market capitalisation of $499bn, it is still the most valuable listed company in Asia and the fifth globally.