Michael Benkowitz, President and COO of United Therapeutics (UTHR), has been a consistent seller of company stock over the past year, with Form 4 filings showing a pronounced disposition bias. Across 285 total transactions, he has recorded zero open-market purchases and roughly $260.2 million in total sales value, all concentrated in UTHR. The most recent activity, spanning late January through late February 2026, shows a recurring pattern: paired option exercises (coded M) followed by same-day open-market sales (coded S), with the sales typically valued at several times the exercise amounts. For instance, on February 23, 2026, he exercised options worth approximately $1.84 million and sold shares for about $6.82 million; similar pairings occurred on February 17, February 9, February 2, and January 26, each involving option exercises between $1.15 million and $1.72 million and sales ranging from roughly $3.7 million to $7.0 million.
The selling has been steady and mechanical rather than reactive, occurring on a near-weekly cadence. The largest single sale came on February 17, 2026, at approximately $7.03 million, while the smallest recent sale, on February 9, was still about $3.74 million. Notably, there are no recent purchases (code P) or acquisitions (code A) in the filing history, and the only non-sale transactions in the last quarter are a gift (code G) on May 13, 2026, valued at zero, and two tax-withholding events (code F) on March 15, 2026, totaling roughly $7.88 million—automatic deductions tied to vesting, not discretionary trades. This pattern—recurring option exercises paired with immediate sales, no buys, and a steady weekly rhythm—points to a systematic liquidation of equity compensation rather than opportunistic timing. The absence of any open-market purchases over the entire filing period reinforces a clear one-way direction: Benkowitz has been monetizing his UTHR holdings, not adding to them.
AI-assisted summary