Fitbit, Coca-Cola Lead List Of Most Notable Insider Trades Of Past Week

Corporate insiders, those who hold high positions and/or own large amounts of a company, have exclusive access to information that the public doesn’t. Therefore, they are required to file any activity with the SEC for transparency. While some of their activity seems to mismatch with the market, their trades may often indicate the future behavior of a stock. Let’s take a look at some notable insider trades of last week.

On March 4, 2016 and 7, 2016 (filed March 8, 2016), Director and major shareholder Steven Joseph Murray sold 1 million shares of Fitbit Inc FIT common stock for a total value of $13,069,521. Recently, the company has been involved in a series of lawsuits involving claims that the heart rate monitoring system on the company’s Charge HR and Surge devices was inaccurate and posed serious risks to consumers.

On March 4, 2016 (filed March 8, 2016), Executive Vice President Alexander Cummings converted 308,900 options of The Coca-Cola Co KO into common stock for the exercise price of $27.76 and then sold those shares for $43.77 for a total of $13,552,879. The stock is trading at a 52-week high due to success of its restructuring initiatives, which have increased efficiency and growth. In 2015, the company cut costs, optimized its supply chain and marketing efforts, and reduced headcount. As a result, the company was able to allocate more funds to marketing and innovation programs, which contributed to top-line growth and capital returns. Other initiatives include refranchising its U.S. bottling territories, as well as increasing its product portfolio, and therefore revenue, through deals with Monster Beverage Corporation and organic juice company Suja.

On March 1, (filed March 8), VP of Core Technologies and Founder Meir Adest sold 38,700 shares of SolarEdge Technologies Inc SEDG at $26 per share for a total value of $1,006,200. Adest also sold 2,675 shares on March 3, 2016 for an average price of $27.74, totaling $74, 207. On March 1, the company announced the launch of a commercial inverter solution in Japan. The company was also mentioned in PV magazine where it was highlighted as one of the leaders in the inverter supplier industry to the residential segment. Recently, the company announced the shipment of its 100 millionth power optimizer.

On March 9, 2016 and March 10, 2016 (filed March 11, 2016), member of the board Jonathan Sokoloff sold 100,000 shares of Shake Shack Inc SHAK common stock for the average price of $34.58 per share for a total of $3,555,798. Similarly, on March 4, 2016 (filed March 8, 2016), shareholder David Swinghamer sold 25,063 shares of Shake Shack common stock for the average price of $42.60 for a total of about $1,067,727. Last week, the company released its Q4:15 earnings, posting better than expected revenues of $51.4 million and earnings of $0.08 per share, compared to estimates of $50.44 million and $0.07, respectively. However, weaker than expected same store sales growth guidance of 2.5-3% for 2016, compared to 13.3% growth in FY15, sent the stock down 11%.