How to Request to Exercise Your Options

Exercising your vested options means converting them into actual shares. Here's how to submit a request to your employer through My Cake, your portal access to Cake.

What you'll need: Vested options that are eligible for exercise and your employer must have enabled the Exercise Requests feature. If you don't see the Request exercise button as you follow the below steps, contact your employer to let them know you'd like to exercise your options.

1. Access your Portfolio — Log in to your Cake account and click the Portfolio tab

2. View your holdings — Find your option grant and click View

   

3. Request exercise — Click the Request exercise button, then complete the exercise details form:

   • Add quantity: Enter how many options you want to exercise

   • Tax to withhold: Add any tax withholding amount to inform your company (can be $0). We recommend consulting with your tax and legal advisor regarding the implications of exercising

   • Review the Exercise price and Total cost calculations

   • Click Next to review and submit your request to company admins

4. Wait for approval — Admins will review your request and you'll be notified via email once it's approved

5. Complete payment — Once approved, return to your Portfolio, go back into your option grant, and expand the dropdown on your previously submitted exercise request to find + Pay now

   

6. Make payment — Transfer funds using the bank details and unique reference code provided

7. Sign the exercise notice — Complete the digital signature process in Cake

After payment confirmation and signing, the company admin will issue your shares and share certificate. You'll see your updated holdings in your Portfolio and can download documents through your original exercise request or through the Documents tab of your portal.

Important: Review your Plan documents before exercising (usually available in the Documents tab). Contact your employer if you need a copy.