We recently published a list of 10 Stocks Insiders Are Buying This Year. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Eagle Financial Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:EFSI) stands against other stocks that insiders are buying this year.
Even though this is just the beginning of the year, we thought it might be interesting to see what stocks have attracted the most attention from insiders. Why? Sometimes, when executives or insiders acquire shares early in the year, it could mean that they expect strong financial results or positive company developments.
On the other hand, insiders sometimes sell shares at the beginning of the year for tax reasons. For example, they can sell shares to harvest tax loss or to balance out gains/losses from the previous year.
Both insider selling and buying can be driven by various motives, however, it’s important to consider these moves within the broader context of the company’s fundamentals, industry trends, and overall market conditions. That’s why due diligence before any investment is of the utmost importance. However, insider trading activity in combination with other relevant determinants can offer valuable insights into a company’s capabilities, helping investors make more informed investment decisions.
To identify the 10 stocks insiders are buying this year we used Insider Monkey’s insider trading stock screener and looked for stocks with at least five insiders buying since the beginning of the year. With each stock, we note the number of insiders who recently bought shares.
Our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds, focusing on insider trading and stock picks from hedge fund investor newsletters and conferences. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
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Eagle Financial Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:EFSI)
Number of Insiders Buying: 21
Eagle Financial Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:EFSI) is the bank holding company for Bank of Clarke, which provides a plethora of retail and commercial banking products and services. It operates in three segments – Community Banking, Marine Lending, and Wealth Management. The bank’s commercial banking business consists of attracting deposits from the general public and investing those funds in commercial, consumer, and real estate loans and corporate, municipal, and U.S. government agency securities. The Bank’s deposits are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to the extent permitted by law.
On February 7, 21 insiders acquired a total of around $506,720 worth of Eagle Financial shares at a price of $32 per share. These purchases came as part of the previously announced underwritten public offering of 1,562,500 shares of its common stock. The company said it plans to use the net proceeds from this offering for general corporate practices, which may include balance sheet restructuring through the repositioning of its available-for-sale debt securities portfolio.
On January 22, 2025, the company’s board of directors announced a quarterly common stock cash dividend of $0.31 per common share.
For the fourth quarter of 2024, Eagle Financial Services (NASDAQ:EFSI) reported a net income of $6.2 million, compared to $3.4 million for the third quarter of 2024.
The stock is currently trading at $32.77, having gone down 9.97% year-to-date. Over the past 12 months, its shares gained 9.27%.
Overall, EFSI ranks 1st on our list of stocks that insiders are buying this year. While we acknowledge the potential of EFSI, our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter time frame. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than EFSI but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and Complete List of 59 AI Companies Under $2 Billion in Market Cap
Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
