David Dobson, a director at John Wiley & Sons (WLY), recently bought 3,000 shares. The buy increased his stake by 61 percent, and came to a total cost just under $95,000.
This marks the first insider buy since 2021. Otherwise, company executives have been sellers of shares, largely last year, with two sales so far this year. One sale came to just under $1,000,000, at a time when shares traded nearly twice as high as today.
Overall, company insiders own 9.0 percent of shares.
The publisher has seen shares drop by about one-third over the past year. While earnings jumped nearly 60 percent, revenues declined nearly 4 percent.
Profits have been low, as demand for reading material has been on the decline, although the company did just make a big beat on its most recent earnings.
Action to take: The drop in shares has pushed the stock to 16 times earnings, and shares now go for about 0.9 times their price-to-sales, their best ratio in two years. Plus, at current prices, Wiley yields 4.4 percent, although that yield may have to come down if earnings remain low.
For traders, shares have been trending lower overall. The September $30 puts, last going for about $1.05, could see mid-double-digit returns in the coming months on a further trend down.
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 of the companies mentioned in this article.