Will Ethridge, chief executive of Financial Times publisher Pearson's North American education division, has sold a big chunk of shares in the company.
He disposed of 33,000 American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) for $16.83 (£1,033p) a time or a total of nearly £350,000.
News of the share sale comes after the day after it emerged that Pearson has frozen Libya's stake in the company, which is bigger than first thought.
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Pearson said in June that the Libyan Investment Authority (LIA) had acquired 24,431,000 shares in the company. Chief executive Marjorie Scardino said she was "uncomfortable" about 3% of the company being owned by the Libyans.
However, Pearson revealed that it "has reasonable cause to believe that the LIA may have acquired an additional 2,141,179 shares resulting in a total interest in 26,572,179 shares." This means the LIA has a 3.27% stake in the company.
Earlier in the week Pearson revealed that it had made an adjusted operating profit of £857m in 2010, up 15% on the year before, as the education business grew 13% to £691m, Penguin added 10% to £106m and the FT Group rose 54% to £60m.
Ethridge joined Pearson in 1988 after the acquisition of the publisher Simon & Schuster.
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