A first-ever insider purchase is not a signal in calm markets
We pre-registered the idea that a brand-new insider position in retail during a calm market would be informative. It was not. First purchases only matter when the market is already frightened.
- Trades: every open-market insider purchase reported to the SEC on Form 4 from 2006 onward that passes our routine-versus-opportunistic filter; for this piece, the buyer had no prior open-market purchase on record.
- Entry: first session after the filing became public. Held 63 trading days (about three months).
- Benchmark: IWM (small caps), because insider-buy candidates skew small and cheap; beating the S&P alone would just be that tilt.
- Market state: stress = SPY at least 10% below its trailing 1-year high on the entry day; calm otherwise.
- Statistics: clustered by company (one vote per company) — five insiders buying the same stock in the same week count once. Cells under 40 trades or 15 companies are shown but greyed. No trading costs deducted.
- What is excluded: companies without a ten-year price history (delisted names are the main gap; see the survivorship note on the evidence page).
Three-month excess return versus small caps for first-ever purchases made during sell-offs, by sector. Sectors with too few trades omitted from the chart, shown in the table.
| Sector (SEC industry group) | In sell-offs | In calm markets | Read |
|---|---|---|---|
| Transport & logistics | +25.4 pts n 17 · t 1.8 | −1.1 pts n 33 · t 0.1 | Too few trades to say |
| Medical devices | +17.9 pts n 27 · t 1.4 | −5.4 pts n 43 · t -1.3 | Too few trades to say |
| Construction | +16.2 pts n 13 · t 3.2 | −5.1 pts n 15 · t -1.1 | Too few trades to say |
| Services | +14.4 pts n 44 · t 2.2 | −2.5 pts n 106 · t -0.7 | Sell-offs only; loses in calm |
| Mining & metals | +12.2 pts n 3 · t 0.0 | −2.6 pts n 12 · t -0.9 | Too few trades to say |
| Energy | +9.6 pts n 22 · t 0.7 | −0.5 pts n 100 · t -0.8 | Too few trades to say |
| Biotech & pharma | +8.4 pts n 28 · t 0.6 | −1.8 pts n 90 · t 0.3 | Too few trades to say |
| Finance & real estate | +7.8 pts n 17 · t 1.4 | +0.1 pts n 56 · t 0.2 | Too few trades to say |
| Telecom & media | +5.9 pts n 4 · t 0.4 | −1.3 pts n 23 · t -1.1 | Too few trades to say |
| REITs | +3.8 pts n 62 · t 0.7 | +0.9 pts n 150 · t -0.3 | No reliable edge |
| Food, drink & tobacco | +3.5 pts n 4 · t 0.3 | −1.1 pts n 25 · t 0.0 | Too few trades to say |
| Retail & consumer | +2.8 pts n 31 · t 1.1 | +0.1 pts n 114 · t 0.9 | Too few trades to say |
| Industrials & manufacturing | +2.7 pts n 89 · t 0.8 | +5.7 pts n 321 · t 1.1 | No reliable edge |
| Utilities | +2.4 pts n 17 · t 0.1 | −2.4 pts n 63 · t -1.7 | Too few trades to say |
| Insurance | +2.3 pts n 27 · t 0.5 | +1.3 pts n 66 · t 0.0 | Too few trades to say |
| Banks | +2.3 pts n 188 · t -0.5 | +1.6 pts n 551 · t 2.2 | Calm markets only |
| Other | +2.1 pts n 41 · t 0.5 | +0.5 pts n 103 · t 0.7 | No reliable edge |
| Software & IT services | −1.1 pts n 13 · t -0.5 | −2.2 pts n 42 · t -0.2 | Too few trades to say |
| Tech hardware & semis | −3.4 pts n 21 · t -0.2 | −3.0 pts n 76 · t -1.3 | Too few trades to say |
| Healthcare services | — | +9.3 pts n 12 · t 1.2 | Too few trades to say |
t is the clustered t-statistic: above 2 means the result is unlikely to be luck; above 3, very unlikely. "n" is trades.
Market state now: NORMAL — the S&P 500 is 3.1% below its one-year high (as of 2026-09-16). The calm column above is the one that applies today; the sell-off numbers are what to expect if conditions change.
Sectors under pressure right now (their own ETF is in a drawdown):
No buy in the last 45 days matches this definition among names we cover.
SAVNG is an educational research publication, not a Registered Investment Adviser. Everything here is general-circulation information produced by an automated pipeline — the same for every reader — and is not personalized investment advice, an offer, or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Any performance figure is hypothetical; past performance does not predict future results. Details.
Published by SAVNG Research. Every figure on this page is read from the study data at render time; if the study changes, the page changes with it.