Old Mutual Limited (JSE:OMU) shareholders (or potential shareholders) will be happy to see that the CEO & Director, Johann Strydom, recently bought a whopping R10.0m worth of stock, at a price of R13.27. There’s no denying a buy of that magnitude suggests conviction in a brighter future, although we do note that proportionally it only increased their holding by -100%.
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Notably, that recent purchase by Johann Strydom is the biggest insider purchase of Old Mutual shares that we’ve seen in the last year. So it’s clear an insider wanted to buy, at around the current price, which is R13.46. Of course they may have changed their mind. But this suggests they are optimistic. While we always like to see insider buying, it’s less meaningful if the purchases were made at much lower prices, as the opportunity they saw may have passed. In this case we’re pleased to report that the insider bought shares at close to current prices. The only individual insider to buy over the last year was Johann Strydom.
You can see a visual depiction of insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last 12 months, below. If you click on the chart, you can see all the individual transactions, including the share price, individual, and the date!
Check out our latest analysis for Old Mutual
There are plenty of other companies that have insiders buying up shares. You probably do not want to miss this free list of undervalued small cap companies that insiders are buying.
Looking at the total insider shareholdings in a company can help to inform your view of whether they are well aligned with common shareholders. We usually like to see fairly high levels of insider ownership. Based on our data, Old Mutual insiders have about 0.07% of the stock, worth approximately R38m. I generally like to see higher levels of ownership.
The recent insider purchase is heartening. And an analysis of the transactions over the last year also gives us confidence. Given that insiders also own a fair bit of Old Mutual we think they are probably pretty confident of a bright future. So while it’s helpful to know what insiders are doing in terms of buying or selling, it’s also helpful to know the risks that a particular company is facing. You’d be interested to know, that we found 1 warning sign for Old Mutual and we suggest you have a look.