Stock Picks 101 - Trading on Insider Activity

Everyone knows that insider trading is illegal, but dostock in the next day or two. Examples of such
you think that keeps it from happening? Of course"newsworthy events" include earnings
not. Just because you're not allowed to trade onannouncements, announcements of research results,
insider information doesn't mean you can't trade onannouncements from various kinds of industry-related
the telltale signatures that insider trading activityconferences or any kind of imminent news item
leaves. This can be quite profitable if you can detectabout the stock or the industry. This is another sure
it in a reliable way.way of detecting that perhaps insider trading is going
Some tools are very useful in detecting insideron.
trading. For one, most of the better discount brokersOnce you've detected this possible insider trading, the
aggregate the news for you. Be sure to use thisnext question is what to do about it. How and when
valuable feature. Having scanning software that filtersdo you enter the trade? Here is where some
for price moves on volume is also vital.experience comes in at detecting what insider trade
You can suspect insider trading is going on when youprice moves look like. You can develop this
see a strong price move in the stock picks you'reexperience by studying price charts that show
monitoring on increasing volume with no news aboutevidence of insider trading. With some good scanning
those stocks. This is the key to detecting insidersoftware you can detect these kinds of price
trading. If the price goes up suddenly on goodmovements.
volume with no news, you really need to askFinding a good entry point is half the battle, but
yourself "Why?" One possible explanation is insiderfinding the right exit point is actually even more
trading.important. You have control over when you enter
To detect these strong price moves you should havethe trade and which stock you pick, but once in it,
scanning software that filters for price moves onyou need to find the exit for that particular stock.
volume. These scans should be run a number ofOften, insider trading will plateau, and also perhaps
times daily, focusing especially on early in the day. It'syou'll suddenly find that there is a newsworthy event
also important to know that there is no significantthat could explain the insider trading. This is how you
"important news" to explain the price moves. Decidingfind the exit point. So, exiting insider trading trades is
what constitutes "important news" requires somea great example of buying the rumor, which in this
experience. Of course, insider trading volume spikescase is unexplained strong price movement on high
can also happen toward the end of the day as well.volume and "selling on the news." This is to say,
These happen in anticipation of importantwhen the news comes out, the party's over, and it's
announcements after the market has closed.time to go find another trade.
When you see a price spike on volume, another thingSo, as you can see from these tips, riding on the
you can check for is whether there is expected tocoattails of insider trading can be quite profitable with
be some significant "newsworthy event" about thatthe right preparation.