Twitter stock traded at a record low last week, further deteriorating investors’ faith in the micro-blogging firm. Therefore, a few insiders bought shares in an effort to restore and retain the faith of investors.
Not all are buying
One of those prominent insiders is Jack Dorsey, interim CEO, who can also be seen as partially responsible for the stock decline as his candid comments during the earnings call pushed the stock down further. During the earnings call, Dorsey told analysts it will take “considerable” time to accelerate user growth. Twitter, which went public in 2013, witnessed its slowest user growth ever in the second quarter.
On Monday, Dorsey informed investors that he bought 31,267 shares of the company for a total price of $875,000 with the per-share price being $27.67. “Investing in @twitter’s future,” Dorsey tweeted on Monday. Dorsey’s total ownership of Twitter’s shares has gone up to 21.9 million shares, and now he owns 3% of the company.
Another insider, director Peter Currie, informed investors that he bought about 9,200 shares worth $249,000 at per share price of $27.03. Last week, two more insiders; CFO Anthony Noto and director Peter Fenton, revealed their purchases of shares.
Not all insiders are buying Twitter stock. Last week, co-founder Evan Williams sold 372,000 shares in open market transactions. Williams, who also sits on the company’s board, is Twitter’s biggest shareholder.
Twitter bags deal with NFL
Apart from the insider buying, a partnership with NFL also pushed the stock up on Monday. Twitter and the NFL signed a multiyear partnership under which the micro-blogging firm will be responsible for delivering videos and other content on a daily basis to the NFL’s ardent fans. Twitter and the NFL have been working together since 2013 through the company’s Amplify program.
On Monday, unusual trading was witnessed in Twitter’s options contracts. According to data from Trade Alert, the ratio between calls and puts trading was noted at 2.6 to 1, which is the highest observed since June 23. Compared to the average daily volume of 179,000 contracts, overall options volume was noted at 211,000 contracts.
On Monday, Twitter shares closed up 9% at $29.50. On Aug. 7, the stock declined to $27.82, which is marginally higher than the firm’s IPO price of $26.
