Insider: Selling at the top?

Over £½m for Hilton Food stake

Hilton Food Group hardly suffered at all during the immediate fallout of the Brexit vote. It's because the meat packer had already lost 20% of its value since hitting a record high on 27 May.

Up at 610p following an 18-month rally, Hilton, which supplies supermarkets like Tesco, had just published a trading update in line with expectations and said volumes in both key markets, the UK and Holland are growing.

But just a few days later it was decided, as part of the FTSE UK Index Series Annual Review, to demote Hilton from the FTSE SmallCap index because of liquidity issues. The sell-off looked overdone - the shares traded at a 30% discount to peers on an enterprise value/cash profit basis - so it was no surprise to see buyers return to Hilton in the post-Brexit recovery.

Now, just five days before the first half of its financial year ends on 17 July, and with the share price back at 600p, Hilton Food chief executive Robert Watson has turned seller.

Watson, who's run Hilton for the past 15 years, is £579,000 richer after offloading 100,000 shares in the company at 550p and a further 5,000 at 582p.

However, Watson, who will present Hilton's next trading update on 21 July, still owns over 2.8 million shares currently worth almost £17 million, so it's fair to say he has "skin in the game".

Companies analyst and Interactive Investor contributor Richard Beddard ran the rule over Hilton last month. "As long as the industrialisation of the food supply continues, Hilton Foods should prosper," he told us.

And this week, Panmure Gordon analyst Peter Smedley added Hilton to his third quarter Conviction List, claiming that in this post-Brexit world, Hilton "offers defensive and high predictability of growth as it sells quality basic food products, for which there will always be continuing demand, to successful blue chip multiple retailers in the developed world".

Last year, the firm generated 62% of turnover outside the UK, and translating that back into sterling, its reporting currency, should be good for profits. That valuation discrepancy relative to its closest peers is "unjustified", argues Smedley, who thinks the shares are worth 715p.

Well-timed departure for Evraz FD

Shares in Russian steel maker Evraz have risen threefold since February. The industry has struggled for years and remains burdened with debts built up during the pre-Credit Crunch commodities boom. But management's plan to shore up the business has had some success, and global steel prices have rocketed in 2016.

In March, the company, part-owned by Chelsea's Roman Abramovich, said net debt had fallen from $5.8 billion (£4.3 billion) to $5.3 billion at the end of 2015, driven by "a programme of countermeasures delivering continuous revenue and cost improvements". Finance director Pavel Tatyanin said he wanted to cut debt by a further $1-1.5 billion.

However, just a week before Evraz publishes production results for the second quarter, and with the share price at a 14-month high, Tatyanin has cashed in 1 million shares at between 156p and 165p, or a weighted average of 160p.

Evraz shares have just broken above key technical resistance at around 149p, but Tatyanin is not playing the market, or predicting a sudden fall. He's actually handed in his resignation and, after almost 15 years at the company, is leaving to "pursue other opportunities".

This article is for information and discussion purposes only and does not form a recommendation to invest or otherwise. The value of an investment may fall. The investments referred to in this article may not be suitable for all investors, and if in doubt, an investor should seek advice from a qualified investment adviser.