Insider Trading 24 August 2012: Facebook’s Peter Thiel Sells $395 million of Shares

by Asif Suria

Insider buying increased with insiders purchasing $155.77 million of their stock last week compared to $57.63 million in the week prior. Selling decreased with insiders selling $1.52 billion worth of stock last week compared to $3.63 billion in the week prior.

Sell/Buy Ratio: The insider Sell/Buy ratio is calculated by dividing the total insider sales in a given week by total insider purchases that week. The adjusted ratio for last week dropped down to 9.77. In other words, insiders sold almost 10 times as much stock as they purchased. The Sell/Buy ratio this week compares favorably with the prior week, when the ratio stood at 63.08.

We are calculating an adjusted ratio by removing transactions by funds and companies and trying as best as possible only to retain information about insiders and 10% owners who are not funds or companies.

Insider Sell Buy Ratio August 24, 2012

Note: As mentioned in the first post in this series, certain industries have their preferred metrics such as same store sales for retailers, funds from operations (FFO) for REITs and revenue per available room (RevPAR) for hotels that provide a better basis for comparison than simple valuation metrics. However metrics like Price/Earnings, Price/Sales and Enterprise Value/EBITDA included below should provide a good starting point for analyzing the majority of stocks.

Notable Insider Buys:

1. Dole Food Company Inc. (DOLE): $12.96

Chairman David H. Murdock acquired 1,907,285 shares of this fresh fruits and vegetables producer, paying $12.46 per share for a total amount of $23.77 million. These shares were purchased indirectly through a trust.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Dole Food Company Inc. here.

2. Zipcar, Inc. (ZIP): $7.63

Director Stephen M. Case acquired 417,013 shares of this car sharing and hourly car rental company, paying $7.96 per share for a total amount of $3.32 million.

Mr. Case, the co-founder of AOL, appears to have stepped up his purchases of Zipcar making these his largest purchases since he started buying earlier this month.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Zipcar, Inc. here.

3. Opko Health, Inc. (OPK): $4.52

CEO & Chairman Phillip Frost M.D. acquired 287,500 shares of this medical devices and drug development company, paying $4.33 per share for a total amount of $1.25 million. These shares were purchased indirectly by Frost Gamma Investments Trust.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Opko Health, Inc. here.

4. Home Loan Servicing Solutions, Ltd. (HLSS): $15.65

Director William C. Erbey acquired 77,103 shares of this mortgage servicing company, paying $15.47 per share for a total amount of $1.2 million. Mr. Erbey increased his stake by 36.01% to 291,245 shares with this purchase.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Home Loan Servicing Solutions, Ltd. here.

5. The Children (PLCE): $56.31

Director Norman S. Matthews acquired 13,350 shares of this children’s clothing retailer, paying $56.03 per share for a total amount of $748,000. Mr. Matthews increased his stake by 24.79% to 67,210 shares with this purchase.

Children’s Place has performed well this summer despite a challenging market based on higher than expected revenue and expectations of higher gross margins for the full year ending January 2013. We wrote the following about the company while reporting a 15,000 share purchase by Mr. Matthews in June,

“Mr. Matthews is the Chairman of the Board at Children’s Place and has served on the board since 2009. He also picked up 21,200 shares last March at an average price of $47.29 as you can see from this page. The company is trading for 5.5 times EBITDA and less than 12 times free cash flow. Considering the $1.8 billion price tag Bain Capital paid for competitor Gymboree in 2010 and using Gymboree’s free cash flow from the year ended January 2010, Bain paid a little over 13 times free cash flow for Gymboree.”

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for The Children here.

You can view the full list of purchases from this Insider Buying page.

Notable Insider Sales:

1. Facebook, Inc. (FB): $19.41

Shares of Facebook were sold by two insiders:

• Director Peter Thiel sold 20,058,068 shares for $19.73, generating $395.8 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through the Founders Fund and various other funds. We normally don’t highlight fund related sales but decided to make an exception in this case because of the size of this sale  and because Thiel was one of the earliest investors in Facebook.
• 10% Owner Dustin A. Moskovitz sold 900,000 shares for $19.52, generating $17.6 million from the sale.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Facebook, Inc. here.

2. Kohl’s Corp. (KSS): $52.5

Shares of this department stores chain were sold by 3 insiders:

• Director William S. Kellogg sold 900,000 shares for $51.51, generating $46.4 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through trusts.
• Director John F. Herma sold 500,000 shares for $51.51, generating $25.8 million from the sale.
• Director Peter M. Sommerhauser sold 43,982 shares for $51.51, generating $2.3 million from the sale. Some of these shares were sold indirectly by Mr. Sommerhauser’s spouse and some through trusts.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Kohl’s Corp. here.

3. The Charles Schwab Corporation (SCHW): $13.27

Chairman Charles R. Schwab sold 1,500,000 shares of this investment brokerage for $13.21, generating $19.8 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through a trust.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for The Charles Schwab Corporation here.

4. Intuit Inc. (INTU): $58.43

Shares of this accounting and tax software company were sold by 3 insiders:

• Chairman of Executive Committee Scott D. Cook sold 200,000 shares for $58.19, generating $11.6 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through trusts.
• EVP, Small Business Group Kiran M. Patel sold 90,000 shares for $58.16, generating $5.2 million from the sale. 75,000 of these shares were sold as a result of exercising opti0ns immediately prior to the sale.
• SVP, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary Laura A. Fennell sold 12,393 shares for $58.33, generating $722,874 from the sale.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Intuit Inc. here.

5. Douglas Emmett Inc (DEI): $23.95

Director Christopher H. Anderson sold 500,000 shares of this apartment REIT for $23.59, generating $11.8 million from the sale. These shares were sold indirectly through a trust.

You can view the list of recent insider transactions for Douglas Emmett Inc here.

You can view the full list of sales from this Insider Sales page.

Other posts by Asif Suria

About the Author

Asif Suria is the founder and editor of Insider Trade Reports, a service that provides daily reports on insider activity and rates the top insider purchases and sales using a proprietary model. He also maintains a Merger Arbitrage tool that displays real-time spreads and covers mergers and acquisitions on a weekly basis.