Higginson buys big into Brown

A recent Christmas trading statement peppered with positive news was quickly followed by the appointment of Angela Spindler as chief executive. This was clearly enough to convince the chairman, Andrew Higginson, that there was a buying opportunity at hand. In fact, on the day of the appointment, Mr Higginson bought 25,500 shares at 368p, worth £93,840. This was soon followed by a further purchase of 56,349 shares worth £213,095, bringing his total holding to 81,849 - a strong vote of confidence in the new boss and the future of the business.

Julia Bradshaw

Leyshon boss shows unconventional belief

Paul Atherley, the managing director of China-focused unconventional gas explorer Leyshon Resources (LRL), is putting his money where his mouth is by purchasing £268,380-worth of his company's shares on the open market. A mining engineer by trade, Mr Atherley has been based in Beijing since 2005 and is currently betting big on a shale gas boom in China’s interior. After selling Leyshon’s Zheng Guang gold project to Chinese buyers in 2009 for $34m (£21m) plus debt repayments, Mr Atherley spent a few years looking for the right opportunity and thinks he has found it in the Zijinshan gas project. The company drilled two wells there in recent months and, although both resulted in significant discoveries, neither well immediately yielded any free-flowing gas - sending Leyshon's shares into a tailspin. The company says this is normal and will attempt to frack the wells to release the gas in mid-March. This is a company to watch and we upgrade the shares to a speculative buy.

Matthew Allan

New Renold boss shows confidence

Weak demand in Europe has rocked industrial chains and gearbox maker Renold (RNO). Chief executive Bob Davies signed off with two profit warnings in as many months, but clearly new man Robert Purcell thinks he can turn things around.

In fact, Mr Purcell is so confident he’s gone on a buying spree. In the 10 days before taking over on 21 January, he bought 875,000 Renold shares. Now, he’s taken his stake to 1m after snapping up another 125,000 at 25.5p. It’s likely he and chairman Mark Harper will work well together - Mr Purcell headed Filtrona’s protection and finishing products division at the same time as Mr Harper was running the specialist plastics supplier. Restructuring Renold’s highly cyclical core chain division is a priority, and Renold has already ditched the obsession with volume in favour of profit and margin generation. Of course, there’s plenty to do and much will depend on Europe, but management action is starting to inspire confidence.

Lee Wild

Buys

Sells

Table compiled by Robert Ansted

Key to abbreviations: ch = chairman; ce = chief executive; cfo = chief financial officer; fd = finance director; coo = chief operating officer; cs =company secretary; md = managing director