Insider Weekends – Director of Retail REIT DDR Makes His Largest Purchase

Welcome to edition 418 of Insider Weekends. Insider buying decreased last week with insiders purchasing $100.92 million of stock compared to $125.17 million in the week prior. Selling also decreased with insiders selling $1.85 billion of stock last week compared to $2.24 million 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 went up to 18.37. In other words, insiders sold more than 18 times as much stock as they purchased. The Sell/Buy ratio this week compares unfavorably with the prior week, when the ratio stood at 17.89.

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. DDR Corp. (DDR): $18

Director Alexander Otto acquired 1,192,879 shares of this shopping center REIT, paying $17.47 per share for a total amount of $20.84 million. Mr. Otto increased his stake by 4.11% to 30,228,916 shares with this purchase.

Alexander Otto is the CEO of closely-held real estate management company ECE Projektmanagement. The company is based in Hamburg, Germany and manages about 200 shopping centers. He has been buying DDR stock actively since late February and following his latest purchases, owns about 16.37% of the company.

Mr. Otto has stepped up his purchases of DDR ahead of a planned spinoff on July 1st, making these his largest purchases in a week since we started tracking insider data eight years ago. We discussed DDR and the spinoff in more detail for premium members in a post earlier today.

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

2. salesforce.com, inc. (CRM): $135.01

Director Susan Wojcicki acquired 6,000 shares of this cloud software company, paying $138.11 per share for a total amount of $828,646. Ms. Wojcicki increased her stake by 9.17% to 71,426 shares with this purchase.

Susan Wojcicki, the CEO of YouTube since February 2014, is the only insider of Salesforce.com that has purchased stock since February 2013 with the exception of a small purchase by General Colin Powell in late 2016. She has been buying salesforce.com stock once a month since January and the size of her purchases this year have been significantly larger than her prior purchases in 2017. Salesforce.com is up over 29% since the start of the year compared to a gain of about 10% for the Nasdaq.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for salesforce.com, inc. here.

3. Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. (AJG): $66.74

President & CEO Patrick J. Gallagher acquired 9,090 shares of this insurance and risk management company, paying $66.11 per share for a total amount of $600,940. Mr. Gallagher increased his stake by 3.69% to 255,628 shares with this purchase. 4,545  of these shares were purchased indirectly by Mr. Gallagher’s spouse.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. here.

4. Mack-Cali Realty Corporation (CLI): $20.68

Director Nathan Gantcher acquired 25,000 shares of this office REIT, paying $20.60 per share for a total amount of $515,000. Mr. Gantcher increased his stake by 48.58% to 76,464 shares with this purchase.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Mack-Cali Realty Corporation here.

5. Marriott Vacations Worldwide Corporation (VAC): $117.98

President & CEO Stephen P. Weisz acquired 4,058 shares of this resorts & casinos chain, paying $117.86 per share for a total amount of $478,276. Mr. Weisz increased his stake by 2.35% to 176,517 shares with this purchase.

Marriott Vacations is currently in the process of merging with ILG, Inc. in a deal valued at $5.44 billion that is expected to close by the end of this year. ILG, formerly know as Interval Leisure Group, had previously merged with the timeshare vacations division of Starwood Hotels called Vistana when Starwood consummated its merger with Marriott in 2016.

With the completion of this merger with ILG, Marriott Vacations will have a very strong position in the timeshare and vacation rental market.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Marriott Vacations Worldwide Corporation here.

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

Notable Insider Sales:

1. Facebook, Inc. (FB): $201.74

Shares of Facebook were sold by 3 insiders:

• COB and CEO Mark Zuckerberg sold 1,244,500 shares for $197.41, generating $245.68 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly by various entities.
• Chief Financial Officer David M. Wehner sold 10,000 shares for $199.90, generating $1.99 million from the sale.
• VP and General Counsel Colin Stretch sold 750 shares for $199.00, generating $149,250 from the sale.

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

2. Walmart Inc. (WMT): $84.82

Director Robson S. Walton sold 1,311,335 shares of Walmart for $83.16, generating $109.06 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly by a trust.

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

3. RealPage, Inc. (RP): $54.95

Chairman President & CEO Stephen T. Winn sold 794,939 shares of this application software company for $56.73, generating $45.09 million from the sale. 476,962 of these shares were sold indirectly by  Seren Capital Ltd.

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

4. G-III Apparel Group, Ltd. (GIII): $46.09

Shares of this apparel chain were sold by 2 insiders:

• CEO Morris Goldfarb sold 770,000 shares for $47.32, generating $36.43 million from the sale. 20,000 of these shares were sold indirectly by Morris And Arlene Goldfarb Family Foundation.
• Director Bokhorst Van Willem sold 2,000 shares for $47.00, generating $94,000 from the sale.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for G-III Apparel Group, Ltd. here.

5. The Gap, Inc. (GPS): $33.39

Director William Sydney Fisher sold 1,000,000 shares of this apparel chain for $32.37, generating $32.37 million from the sale.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for The Gap, 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: I hold a long position in Gap (GPS). 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.

Connect with me on LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/asifsuria or follow me on Twitter @asifsuria