Mark Smucker, a director at Kimberly Clark (KMB), recently bought 827 shares. The buy was a new position for the director, and came to a total cost of $100,051.
This marks the first insider buy at the company in the past two years. Company insiders have been regular sellers of shares, particularly division presidents and the company CEO. Most of the sales have occurred following the exercise of stock options.
Overall, Kimberly Clark insiders own 0.3 percent of shares.
The paper goods manufacturer is down slightly over the past year, underperforming the S&P 500 by about 25 points. Revenues and earnings grew, but by less than 1 percent each.
Kimberly Clark also has a profit margin of less than 9 percent right now. Shares aren’t terribly expensive at 18 times earnings, given the company’s number of leading brands.
Action to take: KMB shares are inexpensive compared to the overall market. And at current prices, shares yield about 4 percent. However, without improving earnings or higher profit margins, shares may continue to lag for some time.
For traders, shares have been range-bound for the past few months and don’t look ready to break significantly higher or lower anytime soon.
An options trade like writing covered calls on shares could lead to higher income. But options traders may want to look elsewhere for a faster-moving opportunity.
Disclosure: The author of this article has no position in the company mentioned here, but may trade after the next 72 hours. The author receives no compensation from any company mentioned in this article.