Insider Trading Signals — December 15, 2025 — Daily Snapshot

Executive Summary

Insider activity filed on December 15, 2025 was balanced by count (11 purchases vs. 11 sales) but heavily skewed toward selling by dollar value. A single $66M sale in VVX by a 10% owner and sizeable CEO disposals at RYAN, UWMC, and MRNA drove most of the outflows.

On the bullish side, 10% owners and CEOs were net buyers in a handful of names, notably ASA, MXF, GF, NRDY, NEWT, TPL and RCG, with open-market purchases ranging from small director buys to a six-figure CEO purchase.

Overall net signal: Strong Bearish by dollars, but with targeted, conviction-style buying from key insiders in selected stocks.

Activity Breakdown

• Purchases (P): 11 filings, about $1.6M in open-market buying.
• Sales (S): 11 filings, about $82.4M in selling — almost entirely driven by a handful of very large trades.
• Exercises (M): ~$12.9M in option exercises, mostly paired with same-day sales in large names.
• Awards & tax events (A/F): Routine compensation-related flows across several tickers.

Net directional signal (by dollars): Strong Bearish

• Buy value (P): ~$1.6M
• Sell value (S): ~$82.4M
• Net: roughly $80.8M more sold than bought

For C-suite and 10% owners (24 of 49 filings), the skew is even stronger:

• Purchases: ~$1.5M
• Sales: ~$81.6M

Top Notable Transactions

Below are the most impactful transactions by size and insider seniority, using 🟢 for purchases, 🔴 for sales, ⚪ for neutral/other.

1. 🔴 VVX — Large 10% Owner Trims Stake (Strong Bearish Signal)
   • Insider: American Industrial Partners Capital Fund VI, L.P., 10 percent owner
   • Transaction: Sale of 1,200,000 shares @ $55.05
   • Value: $66,060,000.00
   • After trade: Still holds 4,550,001 shares, indirect ownership
   • Signal: A very large disposition by a major shareholder; while they retain a substantial position, this single trade dominates the day’s dollar volume.
2. 🔴⚪ RYAN — CEO Option Exercise and Follow-On Sale (Strong Bearish Tilt)
   • Insider: Timothy W. Turner, Chief Executive Officer and director
   • Transactions:
     • ⚪ M-Exercise: 222,000 shares @ $23.14 (options exercised; value $5,137,080.00)
     • 🔴 S-Sale: 129,570 shares @ $53.61 (value $6,946,247.70)
   • After trade: Holds 12,553 shares
   • Signal: Classic exercise-and-sell pattern on a very large notional amount, with the CEO ending up with a relatively small residual stake.
3. 🔴⚪ MRNA — CEO Exercise and Sale Cluster (Bearish by Outcome)
   • Insider: Stephane Bancel, Chief Executive Officer and director
   • Transactions on the same date:
     • ⚪ M-Exercise: 688,073 shares @ $10.90 (value $7,499,995.70)
     • 🔴 S-Sale: 23,853 shares @ $29.485 (value $703,305.71)
     • ⚪ Separate M-Exercise by director Noubar Afeyan (23,853 shares @ $10.90, $259,997.70)
   • After sale (Bancel): 3,924 shares reported as owned
   • Signal: Very large option exercise paired with meaningful selling and a markedly reduced reported stake, which reads more bearish than neutral despite the exercise.
4. 🔴⚪ UWMC — CEO and 10% Owner Two-Day Sale (~$6.8M) (Strong Bearish Signal)
   • Insider: Mat Ishbia, President, CEO, director and 10 percent owner
   • Transactions:
     • 🔴 Sale of 612,287 shares @ $5.63 (value $3,447,175.81)
     • 🔴 Sale of 612,287 shares @ $5.47 (value $3,349,209.89)
   • After trades: Holds 3,730,973–4,343,260 shares reported across the two filings
   • Signal: Back-to-back large open-market sales by a combined CEO/10% owner. Despite still holding a large stake, the size of disposals is notable.
5. 🔴 ODYS — 10% Owner Reduction (Moderate Bearish Signal)
   • Insider: Y.D. More Investments Ltd, 10 percent owner
   • Transaction: Sale of 300,000 shares @ $3.40
   • Value: $1,020,000.00
   • After trade: 323,443 shares remaining
   • Signal: Meaningful trim by a concentrated outside holder, though they remain a substantial shareholder.
6. 🟢 ASA — 10% Owner Adds Nearly $800K (Moderate Bullish Signal)
   • Insider: Saba Capital Management, L.P., 10 percent owner
   • Transaction: Purchase of 13,696 shares @ $57.85
   • Value: $792,313.60
   • After trade: 5,328,891 shares
   • Signal: A sizable incremental purchase by a large institutional holder, reinforcing a high-conviction, long-term position.
7. 🟢 MXF & GF — Institutional Cluster Buying (Bullish Signal)
   • Insider: Saba Capital Management, L.P., 10 percent owner
   • MXF:
     • Purchases of 9,400 shares @ $19.91 ($187,154.00) and 6,008 shares @ $20.20 ($121,361.60)
     • After trades: 1,646,597 shares
   • GF:
     • Purchase of 14,268 shares @ $11.25 ($160,515.00)
     • After trade: 2,122,117 shares
   • Signal: Consistent, multi-name buying by the same 10% owner across related vehicles. This looks like a deliberate increase in exposure rather than a one-off trade.
8. 🟢 NRDY — CEO Open-Market Buy (~$248K) (Moderate Bullish Signal)
   • Insider: Charles K. Cohn, Chief Executive Officer, director and 10 percent owner
   • Transaction: Purchase of 180,000 shares @ $1.38
   • Value: $248,400.00
   • After trade: 32,315,503 shares
   • Signal: CEO/10% owner adding a meaningful dollar amount, even though it’s small relative to his existing large stake. Still a positive, conviction-style signal.
9. 🔴 CDXS — 10% Owner Sells Across Two Dates (Moderate Bearish Signal)
   • Insider: Opaleye Management Inc., 10 percent owner
   • Transactions:
     • Sale of 22,933 shares @ $21.95 ($503,410.02)
     • Sale of 13,826 shares @ $18.68 ($258,266.13)
   • Total value: $761,676.15
   • After trades: Still over 10M shares owned in each filing
   • Signal: Gradual reduction rather than an exit, but sizable enough to register as a moderate bearish data point.
10. 🟢⚪ CPSH — CFO Option Activity and Tax Withholding (Neutral to Slightly Bullish)
    • Insider: Charles Kellogg Griffith Jr., Chief Financial Officer
    • ⚪ M-Exercise: 15,000 shares @ $1.55 ($23,250.00)
    • ⚪ F-InKind: 6,423 shares @ $3.62 withheld for taxes ($23,251.26)
    • After trades: 80,000+ shares reported as owned
    • Signal: Standard compensation-driven exercise and tax withholding; neutral by itself, but the incremental holdings retained after the exercise lean slightly bullish.
11. 🟢 NEWT — Director Buys on the Open Market (Mild Bullish Signal)
    • Insider: Gregory L. Zink, director
    • Transaction: Purchase of 500 shares @ $12.06
    • Value: $6,030.00
    • After trade: 37,707 shares
    • Signal: A small, but clean, open-market director purchase.
12. 🟢 MDRR — CEO/Chairman Adds Shares (Mild Bullish Signal)
    • Insider: Frank Kavanaugh, CEO, Chairman, director and 10 percent owner
    • Transaction: Purchase of 2,494 shares @ $12.99
    • Value: $32,397.06
    • After trade: 302,177 shares
    • Signal: Modest incremental CEO buy; dollar amount is small but directionally positive.

Pattern Analysis

Mega Sale Dominates Dollar Flows

• One 10% owner sale in VVX (~$66M) accounts for the majority of the day’s total dollar outflow.
• Even excluding VVX, high-value CEO and 10% owner sales at RYAN, UWMC and MRNA keep the overall picture bearish by dollars.

Takeaway: Large institutional and sponsor-level holders are actively realizing gains or reallocating capital in select names.

Exercise-and-Sell Patterns in Large Caps

Several large filings show option exercises immediately followed by sales:

• MRNA: CEO and a director exercised large blocks, with the CEO simultaneously selling a meaningful portion and ending with a small residual position.
• RYAN: CEO exercised over 200K shares and sold a large block the next day, reducing his reported holdings to a relatively low level.
• DGICA & CPSH: Smaller scale exercises and tax-related flows, more routine in nature.

Takeaway: Where exercises are paired with substantial same-day or next-day selling, the net signal skews bearish, even though exercises themselves are neutral on paper.

Concentrated Institutional Buying by 10% Owners

A clear cluster of buying by 10% owners appears across a few tickers:

• Saba Capital Management, L.P.:
  • Adding to ASA, MXF, GF with combined purchases well over $1M.
  • Purchases are spread over multiple days and tickers, pointing to a strategy rather than a one-off trade.
• Horizon Kinetics Asset Management LLC and Murray Stahl:
  • Incremental purchases in TPL and RCG, even though the dollar amounts are small.
  • Both already hold large positions, so these trades are more about topping up than establishing stakes.

Takeaway: While sponsor-level selling in VVX is heavy, other institutional 10% owners are quietly building or reinforcing positions elsewhere.

Compensation and Tax-Driven Flows

A sizeable portion of the day’s filings are routine, compensation-related events:

• ARTW and CASS: Multiple A-coded awards to directors and officers, each for relatively small dollar amounts.
• PETV: Two sizable stock awards (A-transactions) to insiders, roughly $76K each.
• KEYS: Six F-coded tax withholding events for senior executives (CFO and several SVPs), each linked to vested stock and priced around $201.40 per share.

Takeaway: These are low-signal events by design — part of ongoing compensation programs rather than discretionary insider decisions.

Role & Ownership Breakdown

Looking at the seniority and ownership of reporters:

• C-suite and 10% owners:
  • 24 of 49 filings.
  • Account for about $96M out of $97.3M in total transaction value.
• 10% owners alone:
  • 15 filings, about $76.2M in transaction value (both buys and sells).
  • Mix of very large sales (VVX, ODYS, CDXS) and meaningful buys (ASA, MXF, GF, TPL, RCG).
• CEOs:
  • 9 filings totaling roughly $26.7M, highly skewed toward selling at RYAN, UWMC, MRNA, with offsetting purchases at NRDY and MDRR.

Takeaway: Almost all of today’s dollar volume comes from very senior insiders and major shareholders, making these signals more meaningful than low-level or tiny trades.

Market Implications

1. Bearish Tilt from Sponsors and CEOs
   The combination of a $66M sponsor sale in VVX and multiple multi-million-dollar CEO disposals (especially at RYAN, UWMC, MRNA) paints a decidedly risk-off picture among top decision-makers in those names. These are not token trades; they are material reallocations or profit-taking events.
2. Offsetting Pockets of Conviction Buying
   At the same time, 10% owners and CEOs are adding in a focused set of names:
   • Institutional 10% owners steadily accumulating ASA, MXF, GF, TPL, RCG
   • CEO-level buying at NRDY and smaller, but clean, director/CEO purchases at NEWT and MDRR
     This suggests that while some insiders are de-risking, others see selective opportunity and are deploying capital where they have strong conviction.
3. High-Signal vs. Low-Signal Noise
   A significant share of filings (awards, withholding, small grants) are routine and neutral. The real signal is concentrated in:
   • Large open-market trades by CEOs and 10% owners
   • Exercise-and-sell clusters in major names
   • Coordinated or repeated buying by the same institutional holders across multiple tickers

Key Takeaways

• Dollar flows are strongly bearish today, dominated by a single mega sale in VVX and sizeable CEO disposals in RYAN, UWMC and MRNA.
• 11 buys vs. 11 sells, but sales exceed purchases by more than $80M in notional value.
• C-suite and 10% owners drive nearly all the activity, increasing the informational content of these moves.
• Institutional 10% owners are accumulating ASA, MXF, GF and adding to TPL and RCG, hinting at targeted long-term conviction.
• CEO buying at NRDY (and smaller buys at NEWT, MDRR) offers pockets of bullish insider sentiment amid broader selling.
• Many ARTW, CASS, PETV and KEYS filings are routine compensation and tax events and should be treated as neutral background noise rather than strong signals.

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This is not financial advice. Insider transactions can have many motivations beyond stock outlook.
Do your own due diligence.
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