Microsoft CEO and chief cheerleader Steve Ballmer is selling about $2 billion in Microsoft stock, an apparent move to avoid higher capital gains taxes with the possible expiration of the "Bush tax cuts" this year. Whatever the reason it is not, Ballmer stresses, a comment on his faith in is company.

"Even though this is a personal financial matter, I want to be clear about this to avoid any confusion," Ballmer said in a statement. "I am excited about our new products and the potential for our technology to change people's lives, and I remain fully committed to Microsoft and its success."

Ballmer intends to sell 75 million shares by year's end, leaving him with 333 million, according to the statement.

Microsoft has been an okay investment but primarily because it pays a dividend, which increased to 13 cents from eleven cents at the end of 2008. The price of a share has barely changed in the seven years since Ballmer last sold any of his holdings, and closed Friday at about $27. It peaked during those seven years at about $33, during November 2007, on anticipation (which bore out a few months later) that Microsoft was going to make what turned out to be a sloppily rejected offer to buy Yahoo.

With Republicans taking control of the House in the Nov. 2 election President Obama may compromise and agree to include those with incomes above $250,000 in an extension of the 10-year-old tax cuts, and not just those making less. But it's not worth the gamble for people like Ballmer who have a lot of net worth tied up in stock.

With the long-term capital gains tax possibly returning to 20 per cent from the current 15 per cent that's a 25 percent 33 percent better return if Ballmer sells before Jan 1 – a very sane bet if you were going to cash out a bit anyway sometime soon.

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