Insider Selling at Exxon Mobil, Insider Buying at Legg Mason, Plus Notable Insider Activity at 3 Other Companies

Founder of Innovative Auto Mirror Supplier Sells Chunk of Shares

Gentex Corporation (NASDAQ:GNTX) has seen its most informed and influential executive sell shares over the past several trading sessions. Fred T. Bauer, the Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Gentex, discarded 28,100 shares on Friday for $16.40 each and 238,200 shares on Monday at $16.42 each. After the recent transactions, Mr. Bauer holds an ownership stake of 6.35 million shares.

The auto mirror supplier has seen its market value gain 3% since the beginning of the year and could go even higher, thanks to the company’s freshly-introduced rear-view system called Full Display Mirror. Gentex Corporation (NASDAQ:GNTX) commenced the production of this intelligent rear vision system, which uses an externally-mounted video camera and mirror-integrated video display to optimize a vehicle’s rearward view, during the final quarter of 2015. I would pay a great deal of money to have this intelligent rear-view system in my car, so automakers will mostly likely seek to install this high-tech mirror in their vehicles. Royce & Associates, founded by Chuck Royce, reported ownership of 7.24 million shares of Gentex Corporation (NASDAQ:GNTX) in its latest 13F filing.

This Cloud-Based Provider of HCM Software Witnesses Increased Insider Selling

Paylocity Holding Corp (NASDAQ:PCTY) has seen two executives sell shares in the past few trading sessions, but the sales executed by one of them were conducted under a pre-arranged trading plan. In the other case, Michael R. Haske, Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing, sold 36,900 shares on Monday and 23,100 shares on Tuesday at prices of between $38.00 and $40.03 per share, cutting his overall holding to 1.44 million shares.

The shares of the cloud-based provider of payroll and human capital management software solutions for medium-sized organizations have risen by 89% in the past two years and 14% in 2016. Paylocity Holding Corp (NASDAQ:PCTY)’s total revenue for the nine months that ended March 31 was $170.86 million, up from $112.69 million posted for the same period of the previous year. The increase was mainly driven by incremental revenue from new and existing clients, which included revenue from the company’s Affordable Care Act compliance solution. Matthew A. Weatherbie’s Weatherbie Capital was the owner of 1.14 million shares of Paylocity Holding Corp (NASDAQ:PCTY) at the end of March.

Energy Giant VP Sells Shares

Neil A. Chapman, Vice President of Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE:XOM) and President of ExxonMobil Chemical Company, offloaded 12,000 shares on Monday at $89.00 apiece. Mr. Chapman currently owns 230,299 shares of Exxon Mobil following the recent sale.

The world’s largest energy company is one of the best performing companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average Index this year, as Exxon Mobil shares have gained 16% year-to-date. Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE:XOM) cuts its planned 2016 investments by one-fourth to $23 billion in response to depressed crude oil prices, but the oil and gas giant did maintain its dividend. In fact, the company’s Board of Directors increased its quarterly cash dividend to $0.75 per share from $0.73 in late April, with the upped dividend offering an annual yield of 3.31%. Thus, investors’ fears over a possible dividend cut were soothed, which gave a boost to Exxon’s stock performance. Ken Fisher’s Fisher Asset Management owns 4.54 million shares of Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE:XOM) as of the end of the first quarter.

Disclosure: None