Posts related to ‘Insider Activity’

How Much is Benmosche Really Worth to AIG? (AIG, MET)

AIG LogoAmerican International Group, Inc. (NYSE: AIG) is under pressure today after its new CEO Robert Benmosche, who has not even had a full three months yet on the job, has effectively threatened to walk out as CEO of AIG. The reasoning is over the intense restrictions of being under the government, particularly as it pertains to compensation limits.  What is interesting is that this may be a strong CEO throwing the gauntlet at the government.  But we also want to explore what Benmosche is actually worth in real dollar terms to AIG today.  Chances are it is far more than just this 4% we have seen the stock drop today.
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Posted on: November 11, 2009 – 1:00 pm in Compensation, Editor's Picks, Financial Stocks, Insider Activity, Management Change, Regulation, Rumors, Shareholder Issues, Turnarounds, ,

As Buffett Dumps Moody’s (BRK-A, MCO)

Burning Money PicWarren Buffett is dumping Moody’s Corp. (NYSE: MCO).  We’ll never know until it is already done whether the Oracle of Omaha wants to jettison it entirely from the holdings of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A), but he has already lightened up twice in his stake, most recently this last week.  If you listened to Buffett on a CNBC call this morning after his Burlington Northern Santa Fe (NYSE: BNI), a simple interpretation is that he might just be booting all of his Moody’s position.  Our only criticism over this is that Buffett had enough foresight and knowledge that he could have come to the very same conclusion over a year ago at much higher prices.
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Posted on: November 3, 2009 – 12:58 pm in Buffett, Insider Activity, Mergers and Buy Outs, ,

Bill Gates Goes Deeper Into Autos (AN, MSFT, KMX, BRK-A)

Bill Gates ImageWe noted just last week that Bill Gates was getting more entrenched in the waste disposal sector.  It turns out that Mr. Gates is getting deeper into the auto-retailing sector as well.  In an SEC filing after the closing bell, Gates added some 500,000 shares to his stake of AutoNation, Inc. (NYSE: AN).  His Cascade Investment LLC investment vehicle bought 483,800 at a weighted average price of $17.608 and bought another 16,200 shares at a weighted average price of $18.217.  Both transaction dates took place on October 29, 2009.
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Posted on: November 2, 2009 – 5:23 pm in Activist Investor, Autos, Buffett, Insider Activity, , , ,

DragonWave Debuts In U.S. Listing (DRWI, CLWR)

DragonWave LogoDragonWave Inc. (NASDAQ: DRWI) is not exactly a new company nor is it exactly an initial public offering.  The stock has traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the ticker “DWI” since 2007.  It has also been a very strong stock in the Canadian trading as it was under $2.00 at the start of 2009 and rose to over $10.00 (Canadian Dollars) recently. Today, will mark the initiation of the listing on NASDAQ.
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Posted on: October 15, 2009 – 9:50 am in ADR, IPOs, Insider Activity, Secondary Offering, Technology Companies, WiMAX, Wireless, ,

Another Busy SPAC Merger Week (GHC, IAN, DSP, FTBK)

This week kicks off a month’s worth of deal votes guaranteed to keep SPACs’ volume up into November.  SPACUpdate.com has noted how the asset class has already been highlighted for its resiliency and successful SPACs deals are increasingly lending credibility to new mergers being pitched to investors. On Wednesday, Oct. 7, Global Consumer (AMEX: GHC) and Inter-Atlantic (AMEX: IAN) acquisition companies will have deal votes and on the 8th, but the SP Acquisition (AMEX: DSP) proposed merger with Frontier Financial Corporation (NASDAQ: FTBK) appears to have been killed this morning.
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Posted on: October 5, 2009 – 9:50 am in Insider Activity, Mergers and Buy Outs, Private Equity, , , ,

Merger Stocks With Significant Arbitrage (CYCL, T, HNBC, FNFG, PCAP, PSEC, JAVA, ORCL, VM, S, DT, IPCS)

Broken Money Merger ImageDespite the notion that times are tough, mergers are still happening.  If you look back at what we noted, the top 20 companies by market cap had over $335 billion in raw cash that could be used for acquisitions and dividends.  Two of those are in deals noted herein.  We are seeing some significant merger-arbitrage spreads in five of the existing mergers that are currently in the pipe.  These deals are as follows:

  • Centennial Communications Corp. (NASDAQ: CYCL) by AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T);
  • Harleysville National Corp. (NASDAQ: HNBC) by First Niagara Financial Group (NASDAQ: FNFG);
  • Patriot Capital Funding Inc. (NASDAQ: PCAP) by Prospect Capital Corp. (NASDAQ: PSEC);
  • Sun Microsystems Inc. (NASDAQ: JAVA) by Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ: ORCL);
  • Virgin Mobile USA Inc. (NYSE: VM) by Sprint Nextel Corp (NYSE: S).

We have provided specific background and added in some color to highlight the risks and chances of closure of each deal.  There are some significant opportunities here in some of these deals, and some significant risks in others.
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Posted on: September 18, 2009 – 11:38 am in Activist Investor, Banking, Dividend, Editor's Picks, Insider Activity, Mergers and Buy Outs, Telecom, Value Investing, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Paulson Adds Citi to B of A, Goldman, and JPMorgan Holdings (C, BAC, COF, GS, JPM)

Paulson & Co. Inc. has become a very influential firm that can now move a market after John Paulson made billions from properly betting against the fate of the US financial and banking sector before the malaise started to create the wrecking ball of empires last year and earlier this year.  Now a report starting in the New York Post has John Paulson amassing a stake in Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C).  His prior filing had him as a huge stakeholder in Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC) and other somewhat large stakes in Capital One Financial Corp. (NYSE: COF), Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS), and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM).
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Posted on: August 27, 2009 – 9:25 am in Activist Investor, Banking, Financial Stocks, Insider Activity, , , , ,

Fidelity’s Top Portfolio Changes (BAC, WFC, GS, MS, JPM, AAPL, MSFT, CSCO, ORCL, XOM, CVX, PFE, ESRX, WYE, GE, SBUX)

money-stack-imageFidelity Management & Research Company, or FMR, was among the giants which released its quarterly holdings over the most recent days.  While it is always interesting to see which holdings are the top holdings, most traders look at the big portfolio changes to try to gain insight into the minds of fund managers. We looked through the top holdings valued at $1 billion or more solely for the Fidelity Management & Research Company unit and we looked for positions where the position changed by more than 10% up or down by measure of share count rather than by the dollar amount.

There were some serious additions in Q2 in the financial sector to its portfolios.  The tech sector saw some mixed changes, while the drug and consumer changes looked lower.  There was a surprise cut in a key conglomerate and a huge add to one of the Battlestar Galactica coffee stocks.

Of the larger changes to its top holdings in financial stocks, FMR’s major large changes were all additional stakes being taken.  WELLS FARGO & CO (NYSE: WFC) was listed as $6.05 billion via 249.45 million shares, a gain of roughly 36 million shares. J.P. MORGAN CHASE & CO INC. (NYSE: JPM) was worth $5.44 billion from a stake of almost 159.6 million shares, a gain of over 7.1 million shares. BANK OF AMERICA CORP. (NYSE: BAC) was listed as $4.17 billion via a stake of 315.9 million shares, but that is effectively a doubling in size of shares from its Q1 reporting.  GOLDMAN SACHS GROUP INC. (NYSE: GS) was listed as a $3.44 billion stake via 23.35 million shares, a gain of roughly 7 million shares of stock. MORGAN STANLEY (NYSE: MS) was a stake worth some $2.5 billion via some 87.8 million shares, also more than double its previous shares listed.

APPLE INC. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is one of its top few holdings at $5.96 billion, and this was a gain of more than 10% to 4,59 million shares. MICROSOFT CORP. (NASDAQ: MSFT) was a huge gain by almost one-third of its stake to some 163 million shares of stock worth a reported $3.87 billion. ORACLE CORP. (NASDAQ: ORCL) was listed as being worth some $2.79 billion via 130.3 million shares, a gain of about 15.3 million shares.  IBM (IBM) was worth $1.00 billion via 9.62 million shares, but this is after a drop of roughly 4.3 million shares.
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Posted on: August 17, 2009 – 4:58 pm in Banking, Drug companies, Financial Stocks, Insider Activity, Mutual Funds, Oil & Gas, Technology Companies, Telecom, Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Paulson, Esteemed Bank Short Seller, Now Long Financials (BAC, COF, GS, JPM, FITB, FHN, MI, PBCT, SKF, RF, STT, STI)

John Paulson has been well known as a hedge fund manager because of the profits he made from short selling many of the key financial stocks.  Yet his new filing shows a large long position as of the quarter-end June 30, 2009. For example, it lists a huge stake in Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC).  There were many smaller company stakes, but some of the medium-sized stakes (for Paulson that is) are in Capital One Financial Corp. (NYSE: COF), Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS), and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM).  Below are the rest of his financial holdings: Read More »

Posted on: August 12, 2009 – 5:11 pm in Activist Investor, Banking, Financial Stocks, Insider Activity, , , , , , , , , , , ,

More Stocks For Buffett To Unload (BRK-A, MCO, COP, CEG, GCI, WPO, MTB, WBC)

Buffett ImageHow frequently has Warren Buffett  been bashed by the media over Berkshire Hathaway Inc.’s  (NYSE: BRK-A) lackluster performance ?  What was interesting to see is his stake being lowered in Moody’s Corp. (NYSE: MCO).  The only thing that was surprising to us was that it took the Oracle of Omaha this long to begin selling these shares.  Because Buffett is such a large stakeholder, we do expect that he’ll always hold some shares.  Conversely, we think he’ll continue to lighten up his stake in Moody’s.  Along those lines, we reviewed Buffett’s holdings and found several more stocks that he might want to consider selling some or all of his stake.

Some of these positions could include ConocoPhillips (NYSE: COP), Constellation Energy Group, Inc. (NYSE: CEG), Gannett Co. Inc. (NYSE: GCI), Washington Post Co. (NYSE: WPO), M&T Bank Corp. (NYSE: MTB) and WABCO Holdings (NYSE: WBC).  There are others, such as his stakes in drug and health care sectors that could have been mentioned, but those big directional bets may have to wait until after health care reform is enacted.   As you will see, we listed the reasons that Buffett should or could cut the stakes.
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Posted on: July 27, 2009 – 11:48 am in Activist Investor, Buffett, Insider Activity, Value Investing, , , , , , , ,

Buffett Dumps Moody’s (MCO, BRK-A)

Bull and Bear ImageMoody’s Corporation (NYSE: MCO) just got a rather interesting insider selling shares, none other than Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A).  The listed entities were Berkshire itself, National Indemnity, OBH, and GEICO.  The new stake is down to 16.98% from roughly 20.2%.  The filing outlines the terms for more shares to possibly be sold ahead.  Frankly, this should have come long ago.
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Posted on: July 22, 2009 – 5:09 pm in Analyst Calls, Bonds, Buffett, Business Services, Insider Activity, ,

Big Holder Chasing STAAR Surgical (STAA)

money-stack-imageSTAAR Surgical Company (NASDAQ: STAA) has been on a roaring run of late.  In mid-May this stock was under $1.00.  After news of the company getting a nod for its Epiphany cataract lens insertion device, its stock has risen almost 100% and traded north of $2.00 before coming back to $1.94 today.  And then came a capital raise. What is interesting is that a large holder added a large amount to the ownership in that offering.
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Posted on: June 18, 2009 – 9:47 am in Healthcare, Insider Activity, Medical, Secondary Offering,

Angelo Mozilo Charged With Insider Trading (BAC)

Burning Money PicCNBC’s David Faber just reported that the SEC will be charging former Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo with insider trading and disclosure violations for stock sales from 2006 and beyond.  Interestingly enough, Faber noted that criminal charges will NOT accompany the charges.  Former executives Sambol and Sieracki are also to be charged with failure to disclose material information.  We’ll follow up after more information is made available.  So far, there has been no impact at all in Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC) as shares are still up 4.5% at $11.72 on the day.

As far as the fate of any personal tanning machines, no word was given.

Jon C. Ogg
June 4, 2009

Posted on: June 4, 2009 – 2:03 pm in Banking, Financial Stocks, Insider Activity, Law, Management Change, SEC,

CEOs Growing More Confident

Money Stack ImageThere is a growing confidence among Chief Executive Officers.  A report by Chief Executive magazine noted that there is another strong resurgence in May from responses by top executives.  The reading for May came in up 9% to 75.7.  There are no estimates for this number, but that is a gain of 48% from the lows seen in just February.
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Posted on: June 4, 2009 – 9:29 am in Economy, Insider Activity, Labor & Unions, Management Change

Loral Chairman Files To Sell Shares (LORL)

Money Stack ImageLoral Space & Communications Inc. (NASDAQ: LORL) has just filed to sell close to $300 million worth of voting and non-voting shares of common stock in an SEC filing.  The break-down is voting common stock of 954,613 shares and non-voting common stock 9,505,673 shares.  The registration is on behalf of selling shareholders, so none of the proceeds will end up in Loral’s coffers.  The selling stockholders will pay any underwriting fees, discounts or commissions and applicable transfer taxes incurred for the sale of these shares.  In this case, the selling holder(s) are related entities of Loral’s non-executive chairman.
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Posted on: June 2, 2009 – 10:28 am in Insider Activity, Satellite, Secondary Offering,

Only One Man Can Replace Liddy At AIG (AIG)

AIG LogoAmerican International Group, Inc. (NYSE: AIG) has announced that Chairman and CEO Ed Liddy will be stepping down.  He is actually waiting for the board of directors to conclude a search for a replacement.  No one will be sorry to see Liddy leave, but it is important to understand that none of the old problems of AIG were as a result of Liddy’s actions.  He was essentially a government appointee and it is a wonder as to why on earth he was even willing to take the CEO and Chairman role in the first place.  Liddy’s biggest controversy was the scandal over bonuses paid to employees following the government bailout, but he claimed this was under the government’s approval.  As far as Liddy’s actions in the company before and after that, it was generally with the government endorsement even if negative publicity was given simultaneously.
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Posted on: May 21, 2009 – 3:27 pm in Financial Stocks, Insider Activity, Management Change,

Time Warner Looks Ahead in Central European Media Investment (CETV, TWX)

Money Stack ImageCentral European Media Enterprises Ltd. (NASDAQ: CETV) issued a statement this morning that the Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX) investment closed.  It is usually hard to know if the seller or the buyer gets the better deal depending upon the market and a myriad of other factosr, but in this case it seems that Time Warner is looking ahead of the game.
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Posted on: May 18, 2009 – 9:54 am in ADR, Insider Activity, Media, Mergers and Buy Outs, Options, ,

Buffett & Berkshire Hathaway Q1-2009 Holdings A to F (BRK-A, AXP, BAC, BNI, KMX, KO, CMCSA, CDCO, COP, CEG, COST, ETN)

Buffett ImageWe have just gotten the Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A)(BRK-B) holdings for the end of Q1-2009.  The cut off date here was March 31, 2009 and there are some changes that have been seen here from the e3nd of Q4.  We have broken these down into 3 groups of ‘A to F’ and  ‘G to O’ and ‘P to Z’ so these fit on one page easier.  Here is the list ‘A ot F.’

  • American Express Co. (NYSE: AXP) over 151.6 million shares, same as  before.
  • Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) 5 million shares; same as last quarter.
  • Burlington Northern Santa Fe (NYSE: BNI) 76.77 million shares; HIGHER than 70.089 million shares of last quarter.
  • Carmax Inc. (NYSE: KMX) 12 million shares; LOWER than the 17.63 million and that is two straight quarters of declines.
  • Coca Cola (NYSE: KO) right at 200 million shares, still same as before.
  • Comcast (NASDAQ: CMCSA) 12 million shares, same as before.
  • Comdisco Holdings (NASDAQ: CDCO) roughly 1.5 million shares, same as before.
  • ConocoPhillips (NYSE: COP) is really lower than the 71.228 million reported as this has been used for cutting taxes, and we already know that the number is lower than what the filing says.
  • Constellation Energy Group (NYSE: CEG) was just updated this week so the number is actually about 12.4 million rather than what the filing shows as being 14.828 million shares.
  • Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ: COST) 5.254 million shares, same as before.
  • Eaton Corp. (NYSE: ETN) 3.2 million shares; looks like new holding but may have been missed before.

Here is the full list of Buffett holdings “G to O”

Here is the full list of Buffett holdings “P to Z”

Jon C. Ogg
May 15, 2009

Posted on: May 15, 2009 – 4:06 pm in Activist Investor, Banking, Buffett, Buffett Holdings, Conglomerates, Insider Activity, Mutual Funds, Value Investing, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Buffett & Berkshire Hathaway Disclose Holdings G to O (BRK-A, GCI, GE, GSK, HD, IR, IRM, JNJ, KFT, LOW, MTB, MCO, NLC, NKE, NSC, NRG)

Buffett ImageThe first quarter of 2009 Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A)(BRK-B) holdings are now out for the cut off date here of March 31, 2009.  There are some changes from the end of Q4.  We have broken these down into 3 groups A to F, G to O, and P to Z so these fit on one page easier.  Here is the list ‘G to O.’

  • Gannett Co. (NYSE: GCI) 3.447 million shares, the same as before.
  • General Electric Corp. (NYSE: GE) 7.777 million shares is the same as before, but does not include the 10% preferred from last year.
  • GlaxoSmithkline (NYSE: GSK) 1.51 million shares, same as before.
  • Home Depot Inc. (NYSE: HD) 3.7 million shares; same as before.
  • Ingersoll-Rand (NYSE: IR) 7.78 million, same as last quarter.
  • Iron Mountain (NYSE: IRM) 3.3722 million shares, same as before.
  • Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) about 32.5 million, ABOVE the prior 28.6 million shares but still down from the 62 million last year.
  • Kraft Foods (NYSE: KFT) over 138 million; looks roughly the same as before.
  • Lowe’s Companies (NYSE: LOW) 6.5 million shares, same as before.
  • M&T Bank Corp. (NYSE: MTB) 6.71 million shares, same as before.
  • Moody’s (NYSE: MCO) 48 million shares, same as before.
  • Nalco Holding (NYSE: NLC) 9.0 million shares; ABOVE our report of 8.730 million last quarter.
  • Nike Inc. (NYSE: NKE) 7.641 million shares, same as before.
  • Norfolk Southern (NYSE: NSC) 1.933 million shares, same as before.
  • NRG Energy (NYSE: NRG) 7.2 million, same as before.

Here is the full list of Buffett holdings “A to F”

Here is the full list of Buffett holdings “P to Z”

Jon C. Ogg
May 15, 2009

Posted on: May 15, 2009 – 4:04 pm in Activist Investor, Buffett, Buffett Holdings, Conglomerates, Insider Activity, Mutual Funds, Value Investing, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Buffett & Berkshire Hathaway Q1-2009 Holdings P to Z (BRK-A, PG, SNY, STI, TMK, USB, USG, UNH, UNP, UPS, WBC, WMT, WPO, WFC, WLP, WSC)

Buffett ImageWarren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A)(BRK-B) holdings for the first quarter of 2009 are now out for the cut off date here of March 31, 2009.  There are some changes from the end of Q4 here in banking and here is the list of stocks alphabetically ‘P to Z.’

  • Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) 96.3 million, same as before.
  • Sanofi Aventis (NYSE: SNY) more than 3.9 million shares, looks same as before.
  • Sun Trust Bank (NYSE: STI) more than 3.2 million shares, same as before.
  • Torchmark Corp. (NYSE: TMK) roughly 2.82 million, same as before.
  • US Bancorp (NYSE: USB) roughly 69 million; ABOVE last quarter’s 67.6 million.
  • USG Corp. (NYSE: USG) 17.072 million shares, same as before.
  • United Health Group (NYSE: UNH) 4.5 million; down from over 6 million.
  • Union Pacific Corp. (NYSE: UNP) 9.55 million shares, above our 8.9 million noted before.
  • United Parcel Service (NYSE: UPS) 1.429 million shares, same as before.
  • WABCO Holdings (NYSE: WBC) 2.7 million shares, same as before.
  • Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) over 19.9 million shares, same as before.
  • Washington Post (NYSE: WPO) over 1.72 million shares, same as before.
  • Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) over 302 million; ABOVE the 290+ million shares the quarter before.
  • Wellpoint Inc. (NYSE: WLP) 4.7773 million shares, same as before.
  • Wesco Financial Corp. (NYSE: WSC) 5.7 million shares, same as before.

Here is the full list of Buffett holdings “A to F”
Here is the full list of Buffett holdings “G to O”

Jon C. Ogg
May 15, 2009

Posted on: May 15, 2009 – 4:02 pm in Activist Investor, Banking, Buffett, Buffett Holdings, Conglomerates, Insider Activity, Mutual Funds, Value Investing, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,