Rothblatt sold 9,500 UTHR shares a day, every day, for two weeks. The cadence is set by an option expiry, not by a view, and the division works out exactly.
Martine A. Rothblatt · Chairperson & CEO, United Therapeutics · family trusts · sales 5, 6, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14 October 2026
A founder-CEO liquidating about $5.1m a day, every trading day, with the stock near $545 and the proceeds routed through four separate family trusts, looks like a quiet, structured exit dressed as routine. The “10b5-1” label is the cover story; the relentlessness is the signal.
FORM 4 · UNITED THERAPEUTICS CORP (UTHR) · Rothblatt Martine A — Dir, Chairperson & CEO
Txn 10/06/2026 · Code M · 9,500 options exercised @ $117.76 strike
Options vested 1/3 each on 03/15/2021, 03/15/2022, 03/15/2023 · expire 03/15/2027
Code S · 9,500 sh sold across 17 transactions, $527.90–$545.50 · gross ~$5.12m
Rule 10b5-1 checkbox: marked · plan adopted 11/07/2025
Plan runs until the earlier of (a) exercise of 1,734,410 options, all expiring 03/15/2027,
or (b) 12/31/2026
Holdings after: options 290,410 (indirect by trust) · common 628,049 indirect by trusts
+ 40,513 direct + 166 by spouse
Three facts dismantle the quiet-exit reading, and each of them is in the filing rather than in my head:
- The plan predates the price. Adopted 7 November 2025, eleven months before these trades. Nothing about October was decided in October.
- The arithmetic closes. 290,410 options remain in the trust. At 9,500 per session that is about 30.6 trading days. From 15 October to the plan’s 31 December end there are roughly 54. The daily quantity is sized to retire the expiring tranche with a margin, not to maximise proceeds. A seller with a view sizes to the market; this is sized to a calendar.
- She is not exiting. After the sale she still holds 628,049 shares indirectly, 40,513 directly and 290,410 options. The sold shares are the ones created by the exercise; the underlying position is intact.
The real mechanic is mundane: options struck at $117.76 expire in March 2027 against a $545 share price. Letting them lapse would forfeit roughly $124m of intrinsic value. Exercise-and-sell at a fixed daily rate is the cheapest way to convert them without moving the stock. The ordinary reading survives because the plan document explains the behaviour completely, and the division comes out right.
A daily quantity that varied with price, a plan adopted within weeks of the selling, or a declining underlying position. None of those are present. Had the 290,410 remaining options not divided cleanly into the sessions left before 31 December, the calendar explanation would have been incomplete and the view explanation would have had room.