- Burberry chair backs fashion house
- N Brown former chair buys shares
- Billington and First Tin owners sell
Fashion firm Burberry (BRBY) received a vote of confidence from chair Gerry Murphy and chief financial officer Catherine Ferry who both bought shares in the company this month.
Murphy picked up 20,000 shares at 725p on 16 July for a total consideration of £145,000 while Ferry acquired over 8,000 shares at 720p the same day for a total outlay of just under £60,000.
Non-executive director Ron Frasch also chipped in with the purchase of around 3,000 shares at 720p for a little over £22,300.
Burberry shares have slumped 47% this year after the firm repeatedly lowered guidance, most recently this month when it announced it would suspend dividends and replace its chief executive.
N BROWN BUYING ALLIANCE
Lord Alliance, former chair of online clothing and footwear retailer N Brown (BWNG:AIM), acquired one million shares of the company at 20p on 15 July for a total consideration of £200,000.
Joshua Alliance, non-executive director and former head of innovation at J.D. Williams, one of N Brown’s key brands, also acquired a million shares at 20p on 15 July for £200,000.
In contrast to Burberry, N Brown shares have enjoyed a good year with a gain of more than 20% thanks to the success of its transformation plan which saw it return to profit in the year to the beginning of March.
METAL GURUS LIGHTEN UP
Shares in Barnsley-based structural steel specialist Billington Holdings (BILN:AIM) have been under pressure this month after major shareholder Gutenga Investments sold a large chunk of stock.
Gutenga, whose director Alexander Ospelt sits on Billington’s board, offloaded around 15% of the shares to take its stake from just below 35% to roughly 20%.
The sale of 1.86 million shares at 460p on 16 July represented total proceeds of £8.56 million and leaves Gutenga with around 2.6 million shares.
The investor said it had always intended to reduce its stake ‘to a more manageable level over time’, according to the Financial Times, but claimed the sale was a one-off and there was no more overhang.
Meanwhile, Nicholas Mather, non-executive director of metals firm First Tin (1SN), sold just under 23% of the company’s shares on 10 July.
The sale of 60 million shares at 4p raised a total of £2.4 million for the highly-experienced director who was appointed non-exec in 2022.
