Options granted back in 2019 at $14.99 per share don’t stay dormant forever. On February 25, 2026, Tesla (TSLA) board director Kathleen Wilson-Thompson — former EVP of Global Human Resources at Walgreens Boots Alliance — exercised a non-qualified stock option for 40,000 shares and sold 25,731 of them the same day, pulling in roughly $10.7 million in gross proceeds at prices ranging from $412.21 to $419.41 per share across seven sale blocks.

The option had been fully vested since June 18, 2022. All transactions were pre-arranged under a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan she adopted on November 26, 2025, per the SEC Form 4 filed February 27, 2026.

The Fact: Wilson-Thompson exercised 40,000 options at $14.99 per share and sold 25,731 of those shares at market prices ranging from $412.21 to $419.41, leaving her with 19,669 Tesla shares held directly.
The Delta: The option exercise price of $14.99 versus the sale price of roughly $415 per share means the net gain on those sold shares is approximately $10.3 million, before taxes.
The Context: This is a pre-scheduled transaction, not a spontaneous market call. The 10b5-1 plan was set up three months before the trade executed, which matters when reading the sentiment signal here.

What the SEC Form 4 Actually Shows

Wilson-Thompson’s February 25 Form 4 documents two distinct transactions: the option exercise, coded “M” in the filing, and a series of seven open-market sales coded “S,” all executed under her November 2025 10b5-1 plan. She started the day with 5,400 shares before adding the 40,000 from the option exercise, then sold in blocks ranging from 80 shares at $412.46 to 7,501 shares at $414.85. The final block of 440 shares cleared at a weighted average of $418.89, and her remaining directly held position settled at 19,669 shares.

The option itself was granted with a monthly vesting schedule starting June 18, 2019, at a rate of 1/36th per month. All 40,000 shares were fully vested by June 18, 2022. She held those options for nearly four more years before exercising them. The option’s expiration date is June 18, 2026, which adds real urgency to the timing: exercise or lose them.

The 10b5-1 Plan Distinction Matters

A Rule 10b5-1 trading plan is a pre-scheduled agreement that lets corporate insiders sell shares at defined future times, prices, or quantities without insider trading liability. The key requirement is that the plan must be established when the insider does not possess material non-public information. Wilson-Thompson set up her plan on November 26, 2025, three months before the February 25 execution date.

That distinction separates this transaction from a reactive sell decision. It also means the timing of the sale says almost nothing about her personal view of Tesla’s near-term prospects at the moment of execution. The plan did the deciding, not her. This is the same structure Kimbal Musk used when he sold $31 million in Tesla stock in May 2025, and the same one Tesla Chair Robyn Denholm used for her $32 million sale in April 2025.

Tesla Insider Activity Has Been a Recurring Story

Wilson-Thompson’s sale sits in a longer pattern of Tesla board members reducing holdings through pre-planned trades. Denholm drew significant attention after selling $180 million in Tesla stock over a six-month period, a level of insider selling that prompted public backlash. In May 2025, Kimbal Musk sold $31 million while fellow board member Antonio Gracias cleared $168 million in the same period — nearly $200 million combined. Those sales happened when TSLA was trading in the $360 range. Wilson-Thompson’s trades executed at roughly $415, a price level that reflects Tesla’s continued run since then.

Not every insider move points in one direction, though. In April 2025, board member Joe Gebbia bought $1.02 million in Tesla stock, the first insider buy in roughly five years. That was genuinely notable precisely because buys are so rare at this level.

Wilson-Thompson Retains a Meaningful Stake

After the sales, Wilson-Thompson holds 19,669 Tesla shares directly. At the $415 midpoint of her sale range, that position is worth approximately $8.2 million. She also still holds 80,948 options, meaning her total exposure to Tesla’s stock price remains substantial. Selling roughly 64% of the shares generated from this option grant while keeping the rest isn’t a full exit. It’s a liquidity event on a position that had been sitting fully vested for nearly four years.

EVXL’s Take

The detail that stops me here isn’t the sale itself. It’s the expiration date. Wilson-Thompson’s option expires June 18, 2026. She set up a 10b5-1 plan in late November 2025 and executed three months later. That’s a textbook “use it before you lose it” situation for long-vested options sitting near a strong price. Nothing suspicious about that at all.

What I find more interesting is the $14.99 exercise price. That option was granted when Tesla was trading at a very different level. Exercising it in February 2026 at $415-per-share market prices represents a roughly 27x return on paper for that tranche. It’s easy to forget how much of Tesla board compensation is tied to options granted years ago at prices that look almost fictional today.

I’d be more concerned about this activity if the 10b5-1 plan weren’t involved, or if we were seeing net reductions in options held alongside the share sales. She still sits on 80,948 options. That’s not the behavior of someone who thinks the stock has permanently topped out. That said, if she has additional 10b5-1 plans in place for those remaining options, the picture shifts. A systematic wind-down looks very different from a one-off liquidity event, and we won’t know which this is until future Form 4 filings arrive.

My read: watch the ongoing Tesla governance story more broadly rather than any single Form 4. If TSLA holds above $380 through Q2 2026, I’d expect at least one more board-level 10b5-1 execution before summer — particularly from any director holding options with a 2026 expiration date similar to Wilson-Thompson’s. These plans don’t get set up and then left unused.

Sources: SEC EDGAR Form 4 filings, Tesla Inc. | SEC Form 4, Kathleen Wilson-Thompson / Tesla, Inc., filed February 27, 2026 via StockTitan

Editorial Note: AI tools were used to assist with research and archive retrieval for this article. All reporting, analysis, and editorial perspectives are by Haye Kesteloo.