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Politics : Ask Michael Burke -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Knighty Tin who wrote (28335)	5/20/1998 5:29:00 PM
From: Cynic 2005	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 132070

ARMONK, N.Y. -- International Business Machines Corp. Chairman Louis V. Gerstner Jr. sold 138,000 shares last week, two days after giving analysts a bullish report that sent IBM stock to new highs. IBM said Mr. Gerstner exercised 150,000 stock options at a price of $23.94 each on Friday, and sold 138,000 of those shares at $125.125 each the same day. Mr. Gerstner made a profit of $13.96 million on the transactions. It was the first time since he joined the computer company in 1993 that Mr. Gerstner has sold IBM shares on the open market. An IBM spokesman said Mr. Gerstner, 56 years old, sold the shares as part of a tax planning and asset diversification program. There was no connection between Mr. Gerstner's speech and the timing of his sale, the spokesman said. The shares that Mr. Gerstner sold represent a little more than 3% of his total IBM holdings. Mr. Gerstner has options on about 4.1 million IBM shares along with 153,000 restricted shares. He also has been an active buyer of IBM shares on the open market, having acquired 306,422 shares since he first came to the company. Last Wednesday, Mr. Gerstner told industry analysts that IBM is confident it can deliver double-digit percentage sales growth in a few years, in constant-currency terms. Those remarks helped boost IBM stock by 4.4% over Thursday and Friday. In New York Stock Exchange composite trading Tuesday, IBM shares closed up 37.5 cents at $125.