T. Rowe Price Associates Inc. sold roughly 81% of its shares of Tesla Inc. over the first three months of the year, marking a sharp retreat for a firm that for years had been one of the electric-car maker’s biggest investors.
The fund manager held 1.7 million Tesla shares as of March 31, down from 8.9 million shares at the end of 2018, according to a Wednesday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
T. Rowe TROW, +0.74% declined to comment on the move, while Tesla didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The move by T. Rowe comes as Tesla shares TSLA, -0.15% have logged a 30% loss for the year through Wednesday, compared with the S&P 500’s SPX, +0.58% 14% gain.
An expanded version of this report appears on WSJ.com.
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