Some Amalgamated Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:AMAL) shareholders may be a little concerned to see that the Senior EVP & Chief Banking Officer, Sam Brown, recently sold a substantial US$1.5m worth of stock at a price of US$48.40 per share. Probably the most concerning element of the whole transaction is that the disposal amounted to 87% of their entire holding.
In fact, the recent sale by Sam Brown was the biggest sale of Amalgamated Financial shares made by an insider individual in the last twelve months, according to our records. That means that an insider was selling shares at around the current price of US$47.87. While insider selling is a negative, to us, it is more negative if the shares are sold at a lower price. Given that the sale took place at around current prices, it makes us a little cautious but is hardly a major concern.
Insiders in Amalgamated Financial didn't buy any shares in the last year. The chart below shows insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last year. If you want to know exactly who sold, for how much, and when, simply click on the graph below!
See our latest analysis for Amalgamated Financial
I will like Amalgamated Financial better if I see some big insider buys. While we wait, check out this free list of undervalued and small cap stocks with considerable, recent, insider buying.
For a common shareholder, it is worth checking how many shares are held by company insiders. A high insider ownership often makes company leadership more mindful of shareholder interests. Insiders own 1.6% of Amalgamated Financial shares, worth about US$24m. We've certainly seen higher levels of insider ownership elsewhere, but these holdings are enough to suggest alignment between insiders and the other shareholders.
Insiders sold Amalgamated Financial shares recently, but they didn't buy any. And even if we look at the last year, we didn't see any purchases. On the plus side, Amalgamated Financial makes money, and is growing profits. Insiders own shares, but we're still pretty cautious, given the history of sales. So we'd only buy after careful consideration. So these insider transactions can help us build a thesis about the stock, but it's also worthwhile knowing the risks facing this company. You'd be interested to know, that we found 1 warning sign for Amalgamated Financial and we suggest you have a look.
But note: Amalgamated Financial may not be the best stock to buy. So take a peek at this free list of interesting companies with high ROE and low debt.
For the purposes of this article, insiders are those individuals who report their transactions to the relevant regulatory body. We currently account for open market transactions and private dispositions of direct interests only, but not derivative transactions or indirect interests.
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