Insider Selling That Might Suggest More Trouble Ahead

Let’s move on to Questar Corporation (NYSE:STR), which operates as an integrated natural gas company in the United States. Colleen Larkin Bell, Vice President and General Counsel of Questar, unloaded 1,706 shares this Tuesday for $18.99 apiece. After the recent sales, the executive owns 8,666 shares, along with an additional amount of 32,155 shares held indirectly. The shares of the company have lost more than 24% since the beginning of the year, but they seem to be in a bottoming-out phase at the moment. But it appears that the executive is not ready to wait until the stock achieves a turnaround, which might somewhat indicate that the stock is not ready to advance either. Earlier this week, Questar’s subsidiary, Wexpro Company, announced a freshly-created joint venture with Piceance Energy, LLC to develop natural gas-producing properties in the Piceance Basin. Jim Simons’ Renaissance Technologies disclosed a stake of nearly 978,000 shares in Questar Corporation (NYSE:STR) through its most recent 13F filing.

Last but not least, Target Corporation (NYSE:TGT) saw one of its Executive Officers sell stock this week. Specifically, Laysha L. Ward, who has acted as Chief Corporate Social Responsibility Officer and Executive Vice President since 2014, sold 5,199 shares at $78.5 apiece on Wednesday, reducing her position to 12,317 shares. It is also worth noting that this holding includes dividend equivalents paid on restricted stock units and performance-based restricted shares. At the same time, Laysha Ward also reported an indirect ownership of 3,818 shares. Just recently, the merchandise retailer appointed Anu Gupta as senior vice president, operational excellence, which is a freshly-created operational role intended to assist the company in identifying customers’ needs more rapidly. Target’s management has been working on improving its supply chain, including out-of-stocks, technology systems and platforms, and customer experience. The retailer’s stock performance has been relatively strong this year, despite suffering multiple slumps over the last few months, returning more than 2% since the start of the year. The recent volatility in the equity markets might have guided Laysha Ward to unload a portion of her stake. Cliff Asness’ AQR Capital Management owns 1.84 million shares of Target Corporation (NYSE:TGT) as of the end of June, making it one of the top shareholders of the retailer.

Disclosure: None