John Schnatter sold the 73,637 shares yesterday at an average $78.17 each, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing this afternoon. The trade left him with 10.4 million shares, and was made in accordance with a so-called Rule 10b5-1 trading plan he adopted Sept. 2, under which he could sell up to $36 million of stock.

With these trading plans, top executives typically sell a predetermined number of shares at fixed intervals to avoid any appearance of trading on insider information.