TSMC Director Buys $300,000 of Stock as Chip Index Falls 12%

Insiders at nine companies reported open-market purchases worth about $6.5 million in Form 4 filings on Monday and Tuesday. Every trade carried transaction code P, an open-market buy, and none was marked under a Rule 10b5-1 plan, according to the filings.

The semiconductor names stand out. Two chip-sector directors bought during a steep selloff. The signal is modest in dollar terms. The timing is what makes it readable.

What did TSMC insiders buy?

TSMC director Michael Splinter bought 840 American depositary shares at $357 on Nov. 5, about $299,880, taking his direct holding to 8,405 ADSs. He bought on the day the U.S. chip index fell about 12%, before a partial rebound the next day. His Form 4 history on EDGAR, which runs back to 2002, shows no earlier open-market purchase of TSMC stock.

TSMC filed roughly 30 other Form 4s on Nov. 10 for officers including chairman and CEO C.C. Wei and CFO Wendell Huang. Each reported 30 to 155 common shares bought on Nov. 6 at a translated $70.50 by the administrator of TSMC's employee stock purchase plan, "pursuant to terms predetermined by the issuer." Those are routine plan purchases, not discretionary market buys, and belong outside this tally. The company separately reported record October revenue on Tuesday.

Was GlobalFoundries' buy a first?

Yes. Director Jack Lazar bought 10,000 shares at $38 on Nov. 6, worth $380,000 and raising his direct holding about 36% to 38,094 shares. It is his first open-market GlobalFoundries purchase on record. Lazar has bought other companies' stock before, including 10,000 Astera Labs shares at $36 in March 2024.

The buy followed GlobalFoundries' third-quarter report, in which communications infrastructure and data center revenue jumped 81%. One purchase does not confirm conviction. A 36% stake increase at a single director is still a small data point.

Who else bought, and for how much?

The filings spanned industrials, energy and supplements as well as chips:

• Nature's Sunshine: Prescott Group Capital Management, run by Phil Frohlich, bought 291,666 shares at $9.50-$9.95 on Nov. 5, about $2,849,811, through its master fund in 20 lots, taking it to 2,236,152 shares. It is the second round in three months; Prescott bought 161,389 shares at $14.69-$16.75 in August, about $2.61 million. Its only earlier EDGAR purchases were about 1,600 shares in May 2017. The fund is buying as the price falls.
• Pampa Energia: Vice president Damián Mindlin bought 20,000 ADSs at $64.37 on Nov. 5, taking his holding to 749,545 ADSs. It was his third straight day of buying — 19,413 ADSs at $68.43 on Nov. 3 and 19,239 at $66.93 on Nov. 4, about $2.62 million together — after 15,000 ADSs and about 1.42 million local shares on Sept. 28.
• CRH: Director Richard Fearon bought 6,000 shares at $94.95 on Nov. 6, worth $569,700, lifting his stake to 150,842. He last bought in March: 3,800 shares at $104.49, about $397,000.
• WESCO: CFO Indraneel Dev bought 1,725 shares at $291.90 on Nov. 5 ($503,528). CHRO Anthony Marino bought 341 shares at $292.97 on Nov. 6 ($99,903).
• TTM Technologies: Director Philip Franklin bought 5,000 shares at $61.92 on Nov. 5, worth $309,600, taking his stake to 161,725. His previous purchases were about 10,000 shares at roughly $11.77 in November 2018.
• Magnachip: CEO Chae Lee bought 70,000 shares at $2.15-$2.27 on Nov. 6, worth $155,360, taking his stake to 458,750. He bought 100,000 shares at $3.17-$3.22, about $318,000, on Sept. 23-24.

What is not said in the WESCO filings?

Each WESCO filing reports a grant of stock options on an equal number of shares, vesting over three years, at exercise prices of $286.47 and $292.68. The filings do not name the program. The one-for-one grants mean these buys come with a company award attached. Neither executive had bought WESCO stock before; Dev's last open-market purchases on EDGAR were of CenturyLink shares in 2019 and 2020. WESCO held a data center investor event on Nov. 10.

MLQ.ai covered the larger CEO purchases separately: ADTRAN's Tom Stanton, Flowco's Joe Bob Edwards and Columbus McKinnon's David Wilson.

Insider buying is a weak predictor on its own. But chip-sector directors buying on a 12% down day, and a display-chip CEO averaging down twice in six weeks, will read as sentiment signals if the sector's October momentum holds.