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Welcome to edition 427 of Insider Weekends. Insider buying declined sharply last week with insiders purchasing $43.43 million of stock compared to $200.17 million in the week prior. Selling on the other hand increased with insiders selling $1.95 billion of stock last week compared to $1.7 billion 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 increased significantly to 44.99. In other words, insiders sold almost 45 times as much stock as they purchased. The Sell/Buy ratio this week compares unfavorably with the prior week, when the ratio stood at 8.5.
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. Portola Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (PTLA): $28.17
Director Jeffrey W. Bird acquired 390,000 shares of this biotech company, paying $25.84 per share for a total amount of $10.08 million. These shares were purchased indirectly through a trust.