• Insider buying can be an encouraging signal for potential investors when markets are near all-time highs.
• One beneficial owner took advantage of secondary offerings at three different companies.
• A chief executive officer under fire also picked up some shares last week.

 

•  

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 markets are near all-time highs.

Insiders continued to add shares despite market volatility and economic uncertainty. Here are some of the most noteworthy insider purchases reported in the past week:

TransDigm Group Inc. (NYSE: TDG) saw a director indirectly add more than 133,300 shares of this aircraft component supplier last week. At prices ranging from $503.57 to $513.05 per share, the latest transactions totaled almost $67.7 million. Moreover, two executives exercised options and sold more than 86,500 shares.

Athenex Inc. (NASDAQ: ATNX) saw a 10% owner take advantage of a secondary offering. Some 1.8 million shares were indirectly acquired for $11.00 each. That totaled $19.80 million. Note that the biopharmaceutical company's CEO, Johnson Yiu Nam Lau, bought 1,000 shares as well. And that beneficial owner, privately owned hedge fund sponsor Perceptive Advisors, also bought $16 million worth of Albireo Pharma Inc. (NASDAQ: ALBO) shares and over $12.37 million worth of Quotient Ltd. (NASDAQ: QTNT) shares in secondary offerings last week.

The Franchise Group Inc. (NASDAQ: FRG) chief executive officer Randal Kahn returned to the buy window to pick up over 149,700 more shares of this parent of Vitamin Shoppe and other franchise businesses. At $24.99 per share, that came to more than $3.74 million. He bought 175,000 shares earlier this month as well.

A director at Intra-Cellular Therapies Inc. (NASDAQ: ITCI) indirectly purchased 49,500 shares of this New York-based company for $29.17 to $29.99 apiece. That totaled more than $1.46 million. Note that the same director also bought 21,000 shares in the previous week.

See also: Insider Sells Toll Brothers Shares

The Nikola Corp. (NASDAQ: NKLA) executive chair, Trevor Milton, scooped up some shares last week despite being under fire. The 41,400 shares of this electric truck maker were priced at $30.10 to $33.60 each. That cost him almost $1.28 million and raised his share count to more than 91.64 million.

Note that some smaller amount of insider buying at Alcoa Corp. (NYSE: AA), Biglari Holdings Inc. (NYSE: BH), Cryolife Inc. (NYSE: CRY), Liberty Latin America (NASDAQ: LILA) and Weyerhaeuser Co. (NYSE: WY) was posted last week as well.

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

Keep up with all the latest breaking news and trading ideas by following Benzinga on Twitter.