Over the last year, a good number of insiders have significantly increased their holdings in Telos Corporation (NASDAQ:TLS). This is encouraging because it indicates that insiders are more optimistic about the company's prospects.

While we would never suggest that investors should base their decisions solely on what the directors of a company have been doing, we would consider it foolish to ignore insider transactions altogether.

Check out our latest analysis for Telos

Telos Insider Transactions Over The Last Year

Over the last year, we can see that the biggest insider purchase was by Chairman John Wood for US$906k worth of shares, at about US$2.31 per share. We do like to see buying, but this purchase was made at well below the current price of US$4.10. Because it occurred at a lower valuation, it doesn't tell us much about whether insiders might find today's price attractive.

Telos insiders may have bought shares in the last year, but they didn't sell any. The chart below shows insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last year. By clicking on the graph below, you can see the precise details of each insider transaction!

There are always plenty of stocks that insiders are buying. So if that suits your style you could check each stock one by one or you could take a look at this free list of companies. (Hint: insiders have been buying them).

Telos Insiders Bought Stock Recently

Over the last three months, we've seen a bit of insider buying at Telos. Independent Director Bradley Jacobs shelled out US$16k for shares in that time. It's great to see that insiders are only buying, not selling. But in this case the amount purchased means the recent transaction may not be very meaningful on its own.

Insider Ownership

Another way to test the alignment between the leaders of a company and other shareholders is to look at how many shares they own. Usually, the higher the insider ownership, the more likely it is that insiders will be incentivised to build the company for the long term. It appears that Telos insiders own 12% of the company, worth about US$35m. While this is a strong but not outstanding level of insider ownership, it's enough to indicate some alignment between management and smaller shareholders.

So What Do The Telos Insider Transactions Indicate?

Insider purchases may have been minimal, in the last three months, but there was no selling at all. That said, the purchases were not large. However, our analysis of transactions over the last year is heartening. Insiders do have a stake in Telos and their transactions don't cause us concern. So these insider transactions can help us build a thesis about the stock, but it's also worthwhile knowing the risks facing this company. When we did our research, we found 4 warning signs for Telos (1 shouldn't be ignored!) that we believe deserve your full attention.