Tesla stock set for 3-for-1 split after market close

Investors in Elon Musk‘s electric vehicle company will get two additional Tesla shares after the market close on Wednesday. And they will begin trading on a split-adjusted basis Thursday.

Tesla shares were up about 1.8% Wednesday morning in anticipation, even though the stock split won’t change anything fundamental about the company’s stock.

Shareholders voted to approve the 3-for-1 Tesla stock split at the company’s annual meeting on Aug. 4 in Austin, Texas.

Theoretically, the split means that more retail investors will be able to afford Tesla stock, but those investors are minuscule compared with institutional investors, and fractional shares were already available to smaller investors.

In a proxy filing earlier this year proposing the new split, Tesla wrote that the move was primarily intended to help the company “offer every employee the option of receiving equity,” and help Tesla “reset the market price” of its common stock to give employees “flexibility in managing their equity.”

Investors will receive an additional two shares of Tesla for each one they already owned as of Aug. 17, 2022.

Tesla’s last stock split, on a 5-for-1 basis, was implemented in August 2020.

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