Polaris CEO to sell 500,000 shares
Tom Tiller, President and CEO of Polaris Industries Inc., announced a plan to sell a portion of his Polaris stock over the next three months.
The trading plan, effective as of February 7, 2005, permits Tiller to dispose of 500,000 shares of Polaris common stock. Overall, he holds approximately 2.8 million Polaris shares directly or in the form of stock options or restricted shares.
“The trading plan provides me the opportunity to exercise vested options and sell shares for personal, diversification and tax reasons,” he said in a prepared statement. “The net effect of the option exercise, stock disposition and the stock based performance incentives that are part of the new contract will be to reduce the number of shares and options that I hold in Polaris by less than 10%.”
In other news from the Minnesota-based manufacturer, Polaris announced that it renewed and extended Tiller’s employment agreement through 2006.
Tiller, 43, joined Polaris as president and chief operating officer in 1998 after 15 years in various management positions with General Electric Corp. He became CEO a year later.
“Polaris has performed exceptionally well under Tom’s leadership. The results speak for themselves,” said Polaris Chairman Greg Palen. “Since Tom arrived, the company has completed 27 consecutive quarters of revenue and earnings growth and our shareholders have received superior returns on their investment in Polaris.”
A $10,000 investment in Polaris stock in 1998 was worth over $50,000 on December 31, 2004, which represents a total return to shareholders of over 400 percent over the past seven years.
Polaris shares closed up 66 cents, or almost one percent, in trading following the February 2 announcement.
