What tends to make a purchase more meaningful
- Several insiders buying around the same time (a cluster buy).
- Senior executives such as the CEO or CFO, who see the most information.
- Size relative to the person's pay or holdings, not just a big dollar figure.
- Unusual timing: an insider who rarely trades, or buys after a long gap, is more notable than one who buys on a routine schedule.
- A good record: some insiders' past purchases have done much better than others'.
Why sales say less
Executives receive much of their pay in stock, so selling is normal. Many sales are also made under Rule 10b5-1 plans scheduled months in advance. Large, unscheduled sales by several senior executives can still be worth noticing, which is why we track them on our Insider Selling page.
The limits
Past results don't guarantee future ones, and a signal that works on average can fail for any given stock. Insiders can be wrong about their own companies, and by the time a Form 4 is public the price may already have moved. Use insider activity as one input alongside valuation, results and news.
How InsiderPrint measures it
Every insider with enough history gets an Insider Score based on how their past purchases did against the S&P 500 over the following 90 days. Our Scorecard shows how cluster buys and our own picks have performed, including the ones that didn't work.