The fact that multiple Synovus Financial Corp. (NYSE:SNV) insiders offloaded a considerable amount of shares over the past year could have raised some eyebrows amongst investors. When evaluating insider transactions, knowing whether insiders are buying is usually more beneficial than knowing whether they are selling, as the latter can be open to many interpretations. However, shareholders should take a deeper look if several insiders are selling stock over a specific time period.

Although we don't think shareholders should simply follow insider transactions, we would consider it foolish to ignore insider transactions altogether.

The Last 12 Months Of Insider Transactions At Synovus Financial

In the last twelve months, the biggest single purchase by an insider was when Executive VP & CFO Andrew Gregory bought US$1.1m worth of shares at a price of US$40.03 per share. Although we like to see insider buying, we note that this large purchase was at significantly below the recent price of US$49.39. While it does suggest insiders consider the stock undervalued at lower prices, this transaction doesn't tell us much about what they think of current prices.

In the last twelve months insiders purchased 54.34k shares for US$2.1m. On the other hand they divested 76.82k shares, for US$2.9m. In total, Synovus Financial insiders sold more than they bought over the last year. You can see a visual depiction of insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last 12 months, below. If you want to know exactly who sold, for how much, and when, simply click on the graph below!

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Have Synovus Financial Insiders Traded Recently?

We saw Executive VP and Head of Corporate & Investment Banking Thomas Dierdorff buy shares worth US$90k in the last three months. That's only a tiny bit more than the sales, worth US$90k. Overall, we don't think these recent trades are particularly informative, one way or the other.

Does Synovus Financial Boast High Insider Ownership?

Many investors like to check how much of a company is owned by insiders. I reckon it's a good sign if insiders own a significant number of shares in the company. Insiders own 1.3% of Synovus Financial shares, worth about US$88m. 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 Synovus Financial Insider Transactions Indicate?

We can't make any useful conclusions about recent trading, since insider buying and selling has been balanced. Recent sales exacerbate our caution arising from analysis of Synovus Financial insider transactions. But it's good to see that insiders own shares in the company. So these insider transactions can help us build a thesis about the stock, but it's also worthwhile knowing the risks facing this company. While conducting our analysis, we found that Synovus Financial has 1 warning sign and it would be unwise to ignore this.

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For the purposes of this article, insiders are those individuals who report their transactions to the relevant regulatory body. We currently account for open market transactions and private dispositions of direct interests only, but not derivative transactions or indirect interests.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.