Who Has Been Buying Airtel Africa Plc (LON:AAF) Shares?

We've lost count of how many times insiders have accumulated shares in a company that goes on to improve markedly. Unfortunately, there are also plenty of examples of share prices declining precipitously after insiders have sold shares. So before you buy or sell Airtel Africa Plc (LON:AAF), you may well want to know whether insiders have been buying or selling.

What Is Insider Selling?

It's quite normal to see company insiders, such as board members, trading in company stock, from time to time. However, rules govern insider transactions, and certain disclosures are required.

We would never suggest that investors should base their decisions solely on what the directors of a company have been doing. But equally, we would consider it foolish to ignore insider transactions altogether. As Peter Lynch said, 'insiders might sell their shares for any number of reasons, but they buy them for only one: they think the price will rise'.

View our latest analysis for Airtel Africa

Airtel Africa Insider Transactions Over The Last Year

In the last twelve months, the biggest single purchase by an insider was when Non-Executive Director Shravin Mittal bought UK£9.9m worth of shares at a price of UK£0.80 per share. That implies that an insider found the current price of UK£0.87 per share to be enticing. Of course they may have changed their mind. But this suggests they are optimistic. We do always like to see insider buying, but it is worth noting if those purchases were made at well below today's share price, as the discount to value may have narrowed with the rising price. Happily, the Airtel Africa insiders decided to buy shares at close to current prices.

While Airtel Africa insiders bought shares during the last year, they didn't sell. You can see the insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last year depicted in the chart below. By clicking on the graph below, you can see the precise details of each insider transaction!

Airtel Africa is not the only stock that insiders are buying. For those who like to find winning investments this free list of growing companies with recent insider purchasing, could be just the ticket.

Insider Ownership

For a common shareholder, it is worth checking how many shares are held by company insiders. We usually like to see fairly high levels of insider ownership. It appears that Airtel Africa insiders own 0.6% of the company, worth about UK£19m. While this is a strong but not outstanding level of insider ownership, it's enough to indicate some alignment between management and smaller shareholders.

What Might The Insider Transactions At Airtel Africa Tell Us?

The fact that there have been no Airtel Africa insider transactions recently certainly doesn't bother us. But insiders have shown more of an appetite for the stock, over the last year. Insiders do have a stake in Airtel Africa and their transactions don't cause us concern. So these insider transactions can help us build a thesis about the stock, but it's also worthwhile knowing the risks facing this company. Case in point: We've spotted 4 warning signs for Airtel Africa you should be aware of.

If you would prefer to check out another company -- one with potentially superior financials -- then do not miss this free list of interesting companies, that have HIGH return on equity 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, but not derivative transactions.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.
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