For now, the stock market seems to like the idea of a Trump presidency, as the Biden campaign and Democrats spiraled precariusly lower like a helicopter crash landing.
Notable Insider buying was nowhere to be found last week. I define notable as corporate insiders shelling out $200k or more. I discount hedge funds and 10% shareholders as they mostly manage other people’s money and their own. You can attribute some of the lack of insider buying to being in the heart of the quarterly earnings blackout, but that’s really nonsense. Insiders find many ways to sell through the blackout periods, and if they were interested in buying, they would.
Name: Liberty 77 Capital L.P. / Liberty 77 Fund International L.P. / STM Partners LLC / Steven T Mnuchin
Position: 10% Owner
Transaction Date: 2024-07-09 Shares Bought: 1,129,609 Average Price Paid: $8.81 Cost: $9,956,487
Company: Lions Gate Entertainment Corp (LGF-B)
Lions Gate Entertainment Corporation was created in 1986 and is headquartered in Santa Monica, California. Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. operates in the film, television, subscription, and location-based entertainment industries in the United States, Canada, and worldwide. The corporation is structured into three business units: motion pictures, television production, and media networks. The Motion Picture business develops and produces feature films, acquires North American and global distribution rights, distributes North American feature films in theaters, home entertainment, and television, and licenses global distribution rights. Television Production creates, produces, and distributes series, movies, miniseries, and nonfiction content worldwide. Media Networks distributes STARZ-branded premium subscription video services locally and internationally through over-the-top platforms and video programming distributors such as cable operators, satellite TV providers, and telecommunications companies.
Liberty 77 Capital L.P., doing business as Liberty Strategic Capital, is a private equity firm. The company mostly invests in technological firms. Liberty Strategic Capital services consumers throughout the state of Washington. Steven T. Mnuchin, former Secretary of the Treasury, leads the firm, which was created in 2021.
Liberty 77 Fund International LP engages in the Financial Services sector. The company is headquartered in Washington, D.C.
STM Partners LLC, a Delaware limited liability entity, has indirect authority over the Liberty Manager and the Liberty Funds’ general partner. Steven T. Mnuchin is the President of STM Partners LLC.
Steven T. Mnuchin is Liberty Strategic Capital’s Founder and Managing Partner, as well as the firm’s Investment Committee Chair. Mr. Mnuchin formerly served as the 77th Secretary of the Treasury, from February 2017 to January 2021. Mr. Mnuchin was in charge of directing the US Treasury, whose objective is to preserve a strong economy, encourage economic growth, and generate job opportunities by creating conditions conducive to success both at home and abroad. Mr. Mnuchin was also responsible for cybersecurity for the financial services industry and all Treasury divisions, including the IRS. Before his confirmation, he was the Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Dune Capital Management. He formed OneWest Bank Group LLC and served as Chairman and CEO until it was sold to CIT Group Inc. Secretary Mnuchin previously worked at The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., where he was a Partner and Chief Information Officer, overseeing the firm’s global information and technology strategy and operations. Secretary Mnuchin got a bachelor’s degree from Yale University.
Opinion: This is a classic vanity buy. Mnuchin wants in Hollywood. If he cannot buy TikTok, this might be the consolation prize. I say he goes for it.
Follow us on Twitter for real-time insider buying alerts at https://twitter.com/theinsidersfund
You can be an insider, too– by clicking here
Insiders sell the stock for many reasons, but they generally buy for just one – to make money. You’ve always heard the best information is inside information. Everyone with any stock market experience pays close attention to what insiders are doing. After all, who knows a business better than the people running it? Officers, directors, and 10% owners are required to inform the public through a Form 4 Filing of any transaction, buy, sell, exercise, or any other within 48 hours of doing so. This info is available for free from the SEC’s Web site, Edgar, although we subscribe to SECForm4 as they provide a way to manage and make sense of the vast realms of data. I’ve tried a lot of vendors. SECForm4 is one of the smaller ones, but I like supporting Frank. He is not arrogant. He’s helpful and has great prices. He also trades on his own data, so I like people that eat what they kill.
The bar is different from selling because the natural state of management is to be a seller. This is because most companies provide significant amounts of management compensation packages as stock and options. Therefore, we analyze unusual patterns with selling, such as insiders selling 25 percent or more of their holdings or multiple insiders selling near 52-week lows. Another red flag is large planned sale programs that start without warning. Unfortunately, the public information disclosure requirements about these programs, referred to as Rule 10b5-1, are horrendously poor. Also, planned sales that pop up out of nowhere are basically sales and are seeking cover under this corporate welfare loophole. I also generally ignore 10 percent shareholders as they tend to be OPM (other people’s money) and perhaps not the smart money on which we are trying to read the tea leaves. I say generally because some 10% shareholders are great investors. Think Warren Buffett and others
Of course, insiders can also be wrong about their Company’s prospects. Don’t let anyone fool you into believing they never make mistakes. Do your own analysis. They can easily be wrong, and in many cases, maybe most cases, have no more idea what the future may hold than you or me. In short, you can lose money following them. We have, and we curse aloud; what were they thinking!
We like Fly on the Wall for keeping up with what events might be happening, analysts’ comments, and whatever else could be moving the stock. Dow Jones news service is an essential tool, but many services pick up their feed like they do Bloomberg. For quick financial analysis, it’s hard to beat Old School Value.
A big callout to my assistant Ambreen who sets up this conversation by listing the notable buys that I’ve identified. She probes the 10k for a reasonable description of the business. I’ve found that to be the most accurate and succinct place to find out what a business actually does.
This blog is solely for educational purposes and the author’s own amusement. Think of the blog as part of my personal investment journal that I am willing to share with the DIY investor. There are also many parts that I am not willing to share if I think it could influence trading action or be detrimental to the Fund’s partners. We could be long, short, or have no position at all in any of the stocks mentioned and express no written or implied obligation to disclose any of that.
The Insiders Fund is for qualified investors and by Prospectus only. Nothing herein should be construed otherwise. THE INSIDERS FUND prefers to invest in companies at or near prices that management has been willing to invest significant amounts of their own money in, but we have no requirement to do so. We also invest in many companies in anticipation of future insider buying or with the expectation that there is none at all.
You can be an insider, too– by clicking here
Prosperous Trading,
