American Tower’s CEO unloads 47,000 shares and the 48-hour silly cycle begins

In Featured News by Wireless Estimator

When a corporate insider such as an officer or director buys or sells their company’s publicly-traded  stock they’re required to file a Form 4 with the Securities and Exchange Commission. American Tower Corporation Chairman, President and CEO James Taiclet did that yesterday when he sold 47,000 shares in a transaction that occurred the day before at a price of $100.99, for a total valuation of $4,746,530.

Jim-Taiclet-American-Tower

If news aggregators can be believed, James Taiclet’s 47,000 shares were sold by James D Jr and his Executive Vice President might be hitting the bricks soon.

Once the form became public on the SEC’s web site, scraper programs on financial sites kicked in and found the information and other available data, and software-driven articles appeared, some with fictitious bylines that are almost as humorous as their headlines.

One had James D Jr selling the shares, another cautioned: Warning American Tower Corp optimists! James Taiclet just unloaded 47,000 shares.

An additional article pointed out: “This is a major stock unloading, and one that is unlikely to remain unnoticed,” hoping that readers will notice a pay-for-click sponsored message from Ron Paul warning of the world’s continued path towards a financial apocalypse, a meltdown that might have been ignited on August 6, 2013 when Taiclet sold 100,000 shares.

Stock ownership varies with the top three towercos
And by tomorrow, after Taiclet’s insider trade ends its typical 48-hour news cycle, some folks may still be concerned that Taiclet is running out of stock to sell other than his remaining 190,342 shares directly owned and 88,976 shares in a grantor retained annuity trust as detailed in his SEC Form 4.

However, according to an April 9, 2015 notice to stockholders, Taiclet beneficially owned 1,386,290 shares where he has sole voting and investment power. The total also includes vested stock options and/or restricted stock units.

Those beneficial shares are not broken down and a request to American Tower for additional information was not returned.

Is American Tower’s EVP  no longer an MVP?
Adding to comical news aggregation, but believed by some to be professional journalism, was breaking news today that American Tower Executive Vice President William Hess sold 10,000 shares and he might be headed out the door or up the ladder.

A news article on OCTA Finance said, “William Hess, the well informed man, who’s for the time being the EVP – Int’l. Operations of American Tower Corp…”.

The below list provides the beneficial ownership of  shares of executive officers and directors for American Tower, Crown Castle International and SBA Communications, according to their latest filing with the SEC.

Beneficially Owned Shares By Tower Owner Execs and Directors
AMERICAN TOWER CORPORATION
Executives/Directors Beneficially owned shares
James D. Taiclet, Jr. 1,386,290
Steven C. Marshall 413,325
Edmund DiSanto 389,291
William H. Hess 207,524
Thomas A. Bartlett 126,383
Samme L. Thompson 74,937
JoAnn A. Reed 71,679
Carolyn F. Katz 67,620
Pamela D.A. Reeve 66,679
Ronald M. Dykes 57,905
David E. Sharbutt 55,714
Raymond P. Dolan 46,679
Gustavo Lara Cantu 32,303
Craig Macnab 9,222
CROWN CASTLE INTERNATIONAL
Executives/Directors Beneficially owned shares
John P. Kelly 705,799
W. Benjamin Moreland 641,722
E. Blake Hawk 325,438
Jay A. Brown 182,370
James D. Young 179,789
Patrick Slowey 76,773
J. Landis Martin 67,845
Edward C. Hutcheson, Jr. 54,233
Lee W. Logan 44,585
Robert F. McKenzie 28,240
Robert E Garris ll 27,427
Ari Q. Fitzgerald 25,385
Dale N. Hatfield 24,693
Cindy Christy 19,560
P. Robert Bartolo 10,065
SBA COMMUNICATIONS
Executives/Directors Beneficially owned shares
Jeffrey A. Stoops 1,336,066
Thomas P. Hunt 250,076
Steven E. Bernstein 230,897
Kurt L. Bagwell 140,478
Brendan T. Cavanagh 135,011
Duncan H. Cocroft 97,266
Jason V. Silberstein 72,205
Jack Langer 27,855
Kevin L. Beebe 22,892
George R. Krouse, Jr. 21,936
Brian C. Carr 4,554