Why Did Steve Jobs Sell All His Apple Stock?

Michael Arrington said Steve Jobs sold all of his Apple stock from the merger that brought him back. Arrington, a junior lawyer on the NeXT sale, missed the call and kept the voicemail for 10 years. Jobs said he had a bunch of Apple stock from the merger and wanted to sell it all, and he sold every share.

The law firm represented Jobs when he sold NeXT to Apple in the late 1990s, negotiating as his lawyers while the bankers did the real work. Arrington was fairly junior and went to Jobs's house a couple of times to get signatures. Jobs sat and talked. He was very charming and a bit crazy. After the transaction closed, the main partner was on vacation and had told Jobs to call if he needed anything. Arrington missed the call, then had to phone the bankers and figure out the sale. Jobs was not chief executive right away and was not super into Apple. He was still a little bitter because Apple had treated him very badly in the 1980s.

Jobs already had NeXT and Pixar, and Pixar was sold later. The shares Jobs told Arrington to dump were the Apple shares from the NeXT deal.