Facebook stock jumps after CEO pledges not to sell

Facebook shares jumped nearly 5% Wednesday following a disclosure that its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, won't sell stock in the company for at least a year. That more than wiped out the losses of a day earlier when the stock hit a record intraday low of $17.55. Zuckerberg holds about 504 million shares and options and had been eligible to start selling them in November. The companycurrently has about 692 million shares eligible for sale. The concern had been that if Zuckerberg flooded the market with additional shares, prices would sink further. The stock ( FB) is still trading at less than half of the $38 that it went for in the social networking giant's initial public offering on May 18. Since the IPO, Facebook's stock has been down on 46 trading days, up on 28 and unchanged on two. Facebook revealed Zuckerberg's commitment in a regulatory filing late Tuesday. It also said that two of its board members, Marc Andreessen and Donald Graham, have no "present intention" to sell stock beyond what they need to cover taxes. Even without Zuckerberg's share, up to 1.2 billion more shares could enter the market over the next several months, including those from employees eligible to sell on Oct. 29. Source: USA Today