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Bill Gates sold 10% of stake in fiscal 2001

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SEATTLE: Bill Gates, co-founder and chairman of Microsoft Corp., sold about

10 per cent of his stake in the software giant last fiscal year, leaving him

with about 12 per cent of the company, a regulatory filing said on Thursday.

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Gates owned nearly 661.75 million shares, or 12.3 per cent of Microsoft as of

June 30, the end of the company's 2001 fiscal year, according to a proxy

statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That was some 70 million

shares less than the 731 million shares Gates owned a year earlier.

The 45-year-old mogul, calculated to be richest man in the world by Forbes

magazine back in June, routinely sells chunks of his Microsoft stake to

diversify his holdings and donate to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the

health and education charity he and his wife founded.

But while his wealth was estimated at $58.7 billion back in June, a slumping

market for technology products and the effects of the Sept. 11 hijack plane

attacks in the United States have hit Microsoft shares, paring the value of his

stake back to about $33 billion on Thursday. Gates is estimated to hold several

billion dollars in a private portfolio managed by his investment vehicle,

Cascade Investment LLC.

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Gates, who as "chief software architect" is molding the company's

strategy to provide fee-based Internet services, also took home $494,992 in

salary in fiscal 2001, a 12-per cent raise over the previous year, the filing

said. Microsoft also awarded Gates a $171,762 bonus, lower than last year's

$200,000.

Gates' right-hand man, Chief Executive Steve Ballmer, owned 239.4 million

Microsoft shares amounting to 4.4 per cent of the company, the filing showed.

That stake is worth about $11.97 billion at Microsoft's Thursday's closing price

of $49.96. Ballmer took home paychecks totaling $494,076, about 15 per cent more

than last year. He also collected a bonus of $171,444, down from $200,000 the

year before, it said.

Former president Jon Shirley, who is still with Microsoft as a director, was

listed as having the next-biggest stake, with 7.86 million shares amounting to

less than 1 per cent of the company, it said.

(C) Reuters Limited 2001.

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