Al Gore has just purchased a big chunk of Apple stock by exercising his Apple stock options.

A filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission shows that Gore exercised options on January 15 to buy 59,000 Apple shares at the price of $7.475 a share.

That means Gore paid around $441,000 for his load of Apple stock. With the shares trading just under $500 this morning, Gore's investment is now worth around $29.5 million.

Of course, Apple stock has been falling recently, although that could turn around next week if the company releases good results for the last quarter. Either way, it's still a giant profit for the nation's former vice president.

Gore has exercised stock options at the same price twice before, according to The Next Web -- once in January of 2008 and again in March that same year. After joining Apple's board of directors in 2003, he was awarded 30,000 stock options, but those carried an exercise price of $14.95.

Gore still has a total of 61,574 Apple shares that he can exercise at bargain-basement prices.