Gek Terna Executive Vice Chairman Acquires 1.4% More Stock

Investors who take an interest in Gek Terna S.A. (ATH:GEKTERNA) should definitely note that the Executive Vice Chairman, Michael Gourzis, recently paid €17.36 per share to buy €347k worth of the stock. Although the purchase only increased their holding by 1.4%, it is still a solid purchase in our view.

Check out our latest analysis for Gek Terna

Gek Terna Insider Transactions Over The Last Year

The Executive Director, Emmanuel Moustakas, made the biggest insider sale in the last 12 months. That single transaction was for €830k worth of shares at a price of €16.60 each. That means that even when the share price was below the current price of €17.16, an insider wanted to cash in some shares. When an insider sells below the current price, it suggests that they considered that lower price to be fair. That makes us wonder what they think of the (higher) recent valuation. While insider selling is not a positive sign, we can't be sure if it does mean insiders think the shares are fully valued, so it's only a weak sign. We note that the biggest single sale was only 33% of Emmanuel Moustakas's holding.

Happily, we note that in the last year insiders paid €1.3m for 73.00k shares. But they sold 108.00k shares for €1.8m. Over the last year we saw more insider selling of Gek Terna shares, than buying. You can see the insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last year depicted in the chart below. If you click on the chart, you can see all the individual transactions, including the share price, individual, and the date!

I will like Gek Terna better if I see some big insider buys. While we wait, check out this free list of undervalued and small cap stocks with considerable, recent, insider buying.

Does Gek Terna Boast High Insider Ownership?

Another way to test the alignment between the leaders of a company and other shareholders is to look at how many shares they own. We usually like to see fairly high levels of insider ownership. It's great to see that Gek Terna insiders own 35% of the company, worth about €595m. Most shareholders would be happy to see this sort of insider ownership, since it suggests that management incentives are well aligned with other shareholders.

What Might The Insider Transactions At Gek Terna Tell Us?

It's certainly positive to see the recent insider purchase. But we can't say the same for the transactions over the last 12 months. Overall, we'd prefer see a more sustained buying from directors, but with a significant insider holding and more recent purchases, Gek Terna insiders are reasonably well aligned, and optimistic for the future. 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 2 warning signs for Gek Terna you should be aware of, and 1 of these can't be ignored.

Of course, you might find a fantastic investment by looking elsewhere. So take a peek at this free list of interesting companies.

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 of direct interests only, but not derivative transactions or indirect interests.

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