Insider Weekends – CEO of Snap Sells $50 Million Worth of Stock

Welcome to edition 400 of Insider Weekends. Insider buying almost doubled last week with insiders purchasing $83.39 million of stock compared to $46.39 million in the week prior. Selling also increased with insiders selling $1.36 billion of stock last week compared to $994.97 million in the week prior.

Little did I expect the S&P 500 to go up for five straight sessions and register a gain of 4.3% for the week after I wrote that I think the risk remains on the downside in this market. My opinion has not changed but the market action last week was a reminder that market action in the short-term is highly unpredictable. Even the Superforecasters featured in Philip E. Tetlock and Dan Gardner’s excellent book Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction were only right about 66% of the time. I did expect insider activity to pick up steam and we did see that happen last week. None of the top 5 insider purchases stood out but we did see Leon Cooperman’s Omega Capital add to their stake in mortgage company Ditech Holdings (DHCP) just like they did with mortgage servicing company Ocwen Financial (OCN) in the week prior.

Sell/Buy Ratio: The insider Sell/Buy ratio is calculated by dividing the total insider sales in a given week by total insider purchases that week. The adjusted ratio for last week dropped to 16.36. In other words, insiders sold more than 16 times as much stock as they purchased. The Sell/Buy ratio this week compares favorably with the prior week, when the ratio stood at 21.45.

Note: As mentioned in the first post in this series, certain industries have their preferred metrics such as same store sales for retailers, funds from operations (FFO) for REITs and revenue per available room (RevPAR) for hotels that provide a better basis for comparison than simple valuation metrics. However metrics like Price/Earnings, Price/Sales and Enterprise Value/EBITDA included below should provide a good starting point for analyzing the majority of stocks.

Notable Insider Buys:

1. Post Holdings, Inc. (POST): $78.5

Director William P. Stiritz acquired 100,000 shares of this cereal products company, paying $71.99 per share for a total amount of $7.19 million. Mr. Stiritz increased his stake by 7.08% to 1,512,362 shares with this purchase.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for here.

2. Victory Capital Holdings, Inc. (VCTR): $13.05

Shares of this investment company were acquired by 3 insiders:

• Director James B. Hawkes acquired 336,071 shares, paying $12.66 per share for a total amount of $4.25 million. Mr. Hawkes increased his stake by -373.41% to 246,071 shares with this purchase. These shares were purchased indirectly by Hawkes Family LLC.
• CEO and Chairman David Craig Brown acquired 16,500 shares, paying $12.20 per share for a total amount of $201,315.
• CFO and Head of Strategy Terence Francis Sullivan acquired 14,000 shares, paying $13.00 per share for a total amount of $182,000.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Victory Capital Holdings, Inc. here.

3. Gaming and Leisure Properties, Inc. (GLPI): $33.77

Shares of this casino real estate investment trust were acquired by 2 insiders:

• SVP, CFO and Treas William J. Clifford acquired 85,000 shares, paying $33.00 per share for a total amount of $2.81 million. Mr. Clifford increased his stake by 31.95% to 351,068 shares with this purchase.
• Chairman,CEO,President Peter M. Carlino acquired 40,000 shares, paying $33.33 per share for a total amount of $1.33 million. Mr. Carlino increased his stake by 0.92% to 4,388,089 shares with this purchase.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Gaming and Leisure Properties, Inc. here.

4. Prospect Capital Corporation (PSEC): $6.82

Chief Executive Officer John F. Barry acquired 467,178 shares of this business development company, paying $6.73 per share for a total amount of $3.14 million. Mr. Barry increased his stake by 1.42% to 33,259,333 shares with this purchase.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Prospect Capital Corporation here.

5. Odonate Therapeutics, Inc. (ODT): $24.95

Chief Executive Officer Kevin C. Tang acquired 128,255 shares of this oncology focused pharmaceutical company, paying $22.47 per share for a total amount of $2.88 million. These shares were purchased indirectly by Tang Capital Management, LLC.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Odonate Therapeutics, Inc. here.

You can view the full list of purchases from this Insider Buying page.

Notable Insider Sales:

1. Facebook, Inc. (FB): $177.36

Shares of Facebook were sold by 3 insiders:

• COB and CEO Mark Zuckerberg sold 617,200 shares for $175.94, generating $108.59 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through various entities.
• Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg sold 55,000 shares for $177.25, generating $9.75 million from the sale. 31,684 of these shares were sold as a result of exercising options immediately prior to the sale.
• Chief Technology Officer Michael Todd Schroepfer sold 38,050 shares for $174.39, generating $6.64 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through a trust.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Facebook, Inc. here.

2. Snap Inc. (SNAP): $20.42

Shares of this camera company were sold by 2 insiders:

• Chief Executive Officer Evan Spiegel sold 2,675,675 shares for $18.72, generating $50.08 million from the sale.
• Director Mitchell Lasky sold 25,000 shares for $18.71, generating $467,812 from the sale.

It was interesting to see Snap insiders sell into the post-earnings bounce after reporting four quarter results where revenue grew 72%, daily active users increased 18% (yoy) and net loss of 13 cents per share was narrower than expected.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Snap Inc. here.

3. Essent Group Ltd. (ESNT): $47.23

Chairman, CEO and President Mark Casale sold 500,000 shares of this mortgage investment company for $44.61, generating $22.31million from the sale.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Essent Group Ltd. here.

4. Alphabet Inc. (GOOG): $1

Shares of Alphabet were sold by 2 insiders:

• Director John L. Doerr sold 11,575 shares for $1079.99, generating $12.5 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through a  trust.
• SVP, Corporate Development David C. Drummond sold 5,690 shares for $1052.50, generating $5.99 million from the sale. These shares were sold as a result of exercising options immediately prior to the sale.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Alphabet Inc. here.

5. PROS Holdings, Inc. (PRO): $32.48

Shares of this application software company were sold by 3 insiders:

• Director Ronald F. Woestemeyer sold 250,000 shares for $31.00, generating $7.75 million from the sale.
• President & CEO Andres Reiner sold 20,000 shares for $30.78, generating $615,600 from the sale.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for PROS Holdings, Inc. here.

You can view the full list of sales from this Insider Sales page.

The list of all insider purchases and sales by management people is only available to InsideArbitrage Premium and Plus members.

Disclaimer: Please do your own due diligence before buying or selling any securities mentioned in this article. We do not warrant the completeness or accuracy of the content or data provided in this article.

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