Britain’s top company bosses went on a share-buying spree in the immediate aftermath of the EU referendum, spending more money on their own stock than at any time in the last decade.
Directors of FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 companies have spent more than £18.5m buying shares in their own firms since the 23 June vote, according to data compiled for FT Money by the broker Olivetree Financial. “This is the largest amount of individual director buys in at least 10 years,” Olivetree said.
The sectors that were hardest hit by the news of Brexit – banks, housebuilders, retailers and travel companies – saw the biggest director purchases.
Many boardroom directors have done well out of these deals as stock markets bounced back following days of dramatic falls when tens of billions of pounds were wiped off the London stock market.
The biggest share buys came in late June and early July. The largest individual transaction in the FTSE 100 was made by Hikma Pharmaceuticals’ founding Darwazah family, which bought £3.3m of shares in the Jordan-based drugmaker the day after the Brexit vote.
In the second-largest dealing, Tony Pidgley, the chairman of the London-focused housebuilder Berkeley Group, snapped up nearly £800,000 of shares on 27 June and has seen them go up in value by 15% since then.
Lloyds Banking Group saw the most deals, as 21 directors bought shares worth more than £750,000. The doorstep lender Provident Financial was in second place, with seven directors buying nearly £1.5m of stock, followed by Vodafone, where five directors snapped up £1.4m of shares.
The data shows that 69 directors from 23 FTSE 100 companies bought their own stock, a total of £10.5m. Eighteen were top level bosses such as chief executives, chairmen and chief financial officers, who bought 37% of the total amount.
On the FTSE 250, 108 directors from 63 companies bought shares in their own businesses. Just over half the total amount of £8m was bought by 39 top-level executives and the rest by other board directors.
Four FTSE 100 companies have seen big share sales by directors – the paper supplier Mondi, National Grid, the brewer SABMiller and United Utilities. Two other firms – the bottling firm Coca-Cola Hellenic and Vodafone - have seen both buys and sells.
