Selling stock options of Facebook caused the compensation of the social network's top team to shrink last year, prompting Mark Zuckerberg to earn only $1 due to waiving both his salary and bonus, the Guardian reported.
Joining the likes of Apple's Steve Jobs, and Google's Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the 29-year-old who founded his company in a Harvard University dorm room will now be claiming only a nominal salary.
But even after restricting his salary, Zuckerberg earned a huge tax bill of $3.3 billion as a result of the stock sale, a new regulatory filing showed.
"The documents, which were filed yesterday, mark the second year in a row that the Facebook CEO has made a large gain on the holding he accumulated in Facebook since starting the company in 2004, after his 2012 stock option earnings totaled $2.3 billion," UK MailOnline reported. "Zuckerberg has now exhausted his supply of the 60 million stock options he was given as a result of Facebook's public offering in 2012."
In order to mainly pay his tax bills on the gains, Zuckerberg sold 41.35 million shares for $55.05 each in December.
A Silicon Valley nonprofit organization was also donated 18 million Facebook shares last December by Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan, totaling nearly $1 billion, according to UK MailOnline.
However, 426.3 million Facebook shares, currently valued at $25.7 billion, are still owned by Zuckerberg despite selling and donating so much Facebook stock.
After smartphones and tablet computers were promised more advertising space by Zuckerberg, the stock more than doubled in value last year.
"The majority of people using Facebook now do so using these devices, as opposed to desktop or laptop computers," UK MailOnline reported. "As a result of Zuckerberg's changes, Facebook now earns more than half of its advertising revenue through mobile devices - up from 23 percent the previous year."
