Introduction

This page provides a comprehensive analysis of the known insider trading history of Michael Fleming. Insiders are officers, directors, or significant investors in a company. It is illegal for insiders to make trades in their companies based on specific, non-public information. This does not mean it is illegal for them to make any trades in their own companies. However, they must report all trades to the SEC via a Form 4. Despite these restrictions, academic research suggests that insiders - in general - tend to outperform the market in their own companies.

Average Trade Profitability

The average trade profitability is the average return of all the open market purchases made by the insider in the last three years. To calculate this, we examine every open-market, unplanned purchase made by the insider, excluding all trades that were marked as part of a 10b5-1 trading plan. We then calculate the average performance of those trades over 3, 6, and 12 months, averaging each of those durations to generate a final performance metric for each trade. Finally, we average all of the performance metrics to calculate a performance metric for the insider. This list only includes insiders that have made at least three trades in the last two years.

If this insiders trade profitability is "N/A", then the insider either has not made any open-market purchases in the last three years, or the trades they’ve made are too recent to calculate a reliable performance metric.

Update Frequency: Daily

See the list of most profitable insider traders.

Companies with Reported Insider Positions

The SEC filings indicate Michael Fleming has reported holdings or trades in the following companies:

Security Title Latest Reported Holdings
US:MRK / Merck & Co., Inc. SVP Chief Ethics & Com Officer 10,283
How to Interpret the Charts

The following charts show the stock performance of securities subsequent to each open-market, non-planned trade made by Michael Fleming. Non-planned trade are trades that were not made as part of a 10b5-1 trading plan. The stock performance is charted as cumulative percent change in share price. For example, if an insider trade was made on January 1, 2019, the chart will show the daily percent change of the security to the present day. If the share price were to go from $10 to $15 during this time, the cumulative percent change in share price would be 50%. A change in price from $10 to $20 would be 100%, and a change in price of $10 to $5 would be -50%.

Ultimately, we are trying to determine how closely the insider’s trades correlate to excess returns (positive or negative) in the share price in order to see if the insider is timing their trades to profit from insider information. Consider the situation where an insider was doing this. In this situation, we would expect either (a) positive returns after purchases, or (b) negative returns after sales. In the case of (a), the PURCHASE chart would show a series of upwardly sloping curves, indicating positive returns after each purchase transaction. In the case of (b), the SALE chart would show a series of downward sloping curves, indicating negative returns after each sale transaction.

However, this alone is not enough to draw conclusions. If, for example, the share price of the company was in a non-cyclical climb over many years, then we would expect all the post-purchase plots to be upwardly sloping. Likewise, non-cyclical declines over many years would result in downward sloping post-trade plots. Neither of these charts would suggest insider trading activity.

The strongest indicator would be a situation where the share price was extremely cyclical, and there were both positive signals in the PURCHASE chart and negative plots on the SALE chart. This situation would be highly suggestive of an insider that was timing trades to their financial advantage.

Insider Trading History

This table shows the complete list of insider trades made by Michael Fleming as disclosed to the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC).

File Date Tran Date Form Ticker Security Code 10b5-1 Shares Remaining Shares Percent
Change
Share
Price
Tran
Value
Remaining
Value
2021-03-02 2021-02-26 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
A - Award 3,437 10,283 50.20 72.62 249,595 746,776
2020-05-06 2020-05-05 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
M - Exercise -1,290 0 -100.00
2020-05-06 2020-05-05 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
F - Taxes -458 6,846 -6.27 76.86 -35,202 526,209
2020-05-06 2020-05-05 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
M - Exercise 1,290 7,304 21.45 76.86 99,149 561,411
2020-05-06 2020-05-04 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
M - Exercise -692 694 -49.93
2020-05-06 2020-05-04 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
F - Taxes -238 6,014 -3.81 77.67 -18,485 467,133
2020-05-06 2020-05-04 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
M - Exercise 692 6,252 12.45 77.67 53,748 485,619
2020-05-05 2020-05-03 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
M - Exercise -1,541 3,084 -33.32
2020-05-05 2020-05-03 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
F - Taxes -529 5,560 -8.69 77.67 -41,087 431,871
2020-05-05 2020-05-03 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
M - Exercise 1,541 6,089 33.88 77.67 119,689 472,959
2020-05-05 2020-05-01 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
A - Award 2,704 2,704
2020-05-05 2020-05-01 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Stock Option (Right to Buy)
A - Award 21,144 21,144
2020-03-03 2020-02-28 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
A - Award 1,659 4,514 58.11 76.56 127,013 345,583
2019-12-16 2019-05-03 4/A MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
A - Award 4,625 4,625
2019-05-13 2019-05-10 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
M - Exercise -1,509 0 -100.00 78.33 -118,200
2019-05-13 2019-05-10 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
F - Taxes -517 2,800 -15.59 78.33 -40,497 219,311
2019-05-13 2019-05-10 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
M - Exercise 1,509 3,317 83.47
2019-05-07 2019-05-04 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
M - Exercise -692 1,386 -33.30 80.00 -55,360 110,880
2019-05-07 2019-05-04 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
F - Taxes -238 1,808 -11.63 80.00 -19,040 144,626
2019-05-07 2019-05-04 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
M - Exercise 692 2,046 51.11
2019-05-07 2019-05-03 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Restricted Stock Unit
A - Award 1,500 1,500
2019-05-07 2019-05-03 4 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Stock Option (right to buy)
A - Award 11,291 11,291
2019-03-28 3 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
2,690
2019-03-28 3 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
2,690
2019-03-28 3 MRK Merck & Co., Inc.
Common Stock
2,690
P
Open market or private purchase of non-derivative or derivative security
S
Open market or private sale of non-derivative or derivative security
A
Grant, award, or other acquisition of securities from the company (such as an option)
C
Conversion of derivative
D
Sale or transfer of securities back to the company
F
Payment of exercise price or tax liability using portion of securities received from the company
G
Gift of securities by or to the insider
K
Equity swaps and similar hedging transactions
M
Exercise or conversion of derivative security received from the company (such as an option)
V
A transaction voluntarily reported on Form 4
J
Other (accompanied by a footnote describing the transaction)