Insider ownership & buying
What it is: how much of the company its own executives and directors personally own — and whether they're adding.
Rules of thumb:
• 5%+ ownership (green) = management eats their own cooking — their net worth suffers with yours
• Founder-led firms with big stakes have historically outperformed as a group
The asymmetry that makes buys golden: insiders SELL for a hundred reasons — houses, taxes, divorce, diversification. They BUY on the open market for exactly one: they believe it's going up. A cluster of buys from multiple insiders near a low is among the strongest signals in markets. (Your insider_tracker watches SEC filings for exactly this.)