Ally Financial Inc. (ALLY) and Two Other Companies Receive Vote Of Confidence from Management and Board

Three Insiders at Ally Financial Bought Shares This Week

Ally Financial Inc. (NYSE:ALLY) registered a cluster of insider buying earlier this week that may be worth the attention of the investment community. To start with, Director Marjorie Magner bought 1,000 shares on Wednesday at $16.72 apiece, which lifted her stake to 21,218 shares. Chief Financial Officer Christopher A. Halmy snapped up 6,000 units of common stock on Wednesday at prices varying from $16.88 to $16.91 per unit, after which Mr. Halmy owns 161,749 units. Furthermore, Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Jonathan Brown filed this week to disclose the purchase of 12,000 shares, which were bought on Wednesday at prices that ranged from $16.80 to $16.82 per share. After the recent purchase, Mr. Brown currently holds a 368,244-share stake.

Ally Financial, the former financing arm of General Motors Company (NYSE:GM), currently focuses on two markets: auto-lending and direct online banking. The company’s banking subsidiary, Ally Bank, is a leading franchise in the fast-growing direct (internet, telephone, mobile, and mail) banking market. In early April, Ally Financial sealed an agreement to acquire online brokerage and digital wealth management company TradeKing Group for roughly $275 million. This acquisition is aimed at expanding Ally Financial’s product offerings by adding online brokerage and digital wealth management. As the company focuses on becoming the premier digital financial services company, the aforementioned acquisition seems perfectly suited considering that half of Ally’s customers said they would consider a digital wealth management solution. Moreover, the digital wealth management market is anticipated to reach $7 trillion by 2020, so the company does have room for growth here. In the meantime, Ally shares have dropped 24% in the past 52 weeks. Andy Redleaf’s Whitebox Advisors reported ownership of 1.05 million shares of Ally Financial Inc. (NYSE:ALLY) in its 13F filing for the March quarter.

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