Last Week's Notable Insider Buys: Navitas Semiconductor, Truist Financial And More

• Insider buying can be an encouraging signal for potential investors, especially when markets are uncertain or near highs.


• The initial public offering of a SPAC merger prompted some insider purchases.


• The chief executive officer of a financial services outfit was among the week's notable buyers.

Conventional wisdom says that insiders and 10% owners really only buy shares of a company for one reason: they believe the stock price will rise and they want to profit from it. So insider buying can be an encouraging signal for potential investors, particularly when there is uncertainty in the markets or the markets are near all-time highs.

Note that with the earnings-reporting season underway, the windows for many insiders to buy or sell shares are closed. Here are a few of the most noteworthy insider purchases that were reported in the past week.

Two directors of the SPAC merger partner of Navitas Semiconductor Corp. NVTS acquired 2.83 million shares altogether in the initial public offering of this Ireland-based integrated circuits maker. At $10 per share, that cost those buyers $28.3 million. So far, the stock has traded between $11.73 and $14.08 per share, and shares ended the week at $12.18, up almost 20% from the purchase price.

Sight Sciences Inc SGHT saw a director pick up some shares early in the week. The more than 527,000 shares purchased added up to nearly $12.65 million, at a per-share price of $24.00. This medical device maker went public back in July, and so far the shares have traded between $21.01 and $42.57 apiece. They were last seen at $25.64, above the director's purchase price.

Last week, a director at AppFolio Inc APPF added more than 72,800 shares via trust of this cloud-based business software a services provider. At $130.87 apiece, the cost for those shares totaled more than $9.53 million. Note that this director also sold those shares to trusts previously established for the benefit of that director's children and grandchildren. The stock ended the week at $132.96 a share.

The purchase of 67,000 Truist Financial Corp TFC shares by CEO William Rogers at about $61.85 apiece totaled over $4.14 million and bucked a trend. Four other insiders sold almost 219,300 shares last week as well. The CEO's stake rose to around 712,500 shares, and the stock was trading a $64.44 per share at Friday's close. That was a gain of more than 4% from his purchase price.

See also: 4 Stocks Insiders Are Selling

Some other sizable insider purchases reported last week:

• E2open Parent Holdings Inc ETWO CEO and two other executives buy more than 116,000 shares for over $1.3 million.


• Riley Exploration Permian Inc REPX beneficial owner buys almost 25,000 shares for more than $656,000.


• Mueller Industries, Inc. MLI director buys about 11,400 shares for almost $544,000.


• Highpeak Energy Inc HPK president buys more than 45,000 shares for over $454,000.

At the time of this writing, the author had no position in the mentioned equities.

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