Insider Weekends: A Look Back At The Hits And Misses Of 2019

Welcome to the last edition of Insider Weekends for 2019. This has been an interesting year when it comes to insider purchases with several well-timed purchases by insiders including,

• the purchase of Eidos Therapeutics (EIDX) by its CEO in June and then again in July
• the purchase of AbbVie (ABBV) by a trio of insiders after the company announced the acquisition of Allergan (AGN)
• the purchase of First Citizens Bancshares by a brother-sister duo

There were several misses as well including,

• Jay Hoag’s purchases of Zillow (Z) in late Spring while profitable were not as well timed as his purchases in late 2018
• the cluster purchase by the insiders of Coty Inc. (COTY), which we were not very enthusiastic about and turned in sizable losses for the insiders
• purchases of Kinder Morgan by Richard Kinder throughout the year appeared to be a strong signal but the stock is only up marginally (not accounting for dividends)

As we have mentioned in the past, insider purchases are a good starting point for research and I find them most useful for bringing companies to my attention that I might have otherwise missed. They help me in the idea generation part of the investing process but they need more work to see if the insiders are being myopically optimistic despite warning signs for their industry or buying just to signal the market.

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