Bezos to sell up to 50 million Amazon shares by January 31 next year, filing shows

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos will sell up to 50 million shares in the online retail and cloud services firm over the next one year, according to a company filing on Friday.

The securities are worth US$8.6 billion at the current price of US$171.8 share.

The sale plan, which is subject to certain conditions, was adopted on November 8 last year and will be completed by January 31, 2025, according to the company's latest annual report.

Amazon shares ended nearly 8 percent higher on Friday after the e-commerce heavyweight reported higher-than-expected sales for the holiday quarter and its lucrative cloud business signaled early gains from AI-powered features.

They had surged more than 80 percent last year amid a broader rally in tech stocks and outperformed the benchmark S&P 500 index.

Bezos founded Amazon as a bookseller in 1994. He stepped down as its chief executive and took over as executive chairman in 2021.

He is currently the world's third richest person with a net worth of US$185 billion, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.