Northwest Insiders Dumping Company Stock

Top officials at financially ailing Eagan, Minn.-based Northwest Airlines have been selling company stock at a strikingly strong pace.

Northwest director Gary Wilson has sold more than 75 percent of his NWA holdings, 3.2 million shares, since May, and director Al Checchi unloaded more than 85 percent of 4.6 million shares since the turn of the year, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported Monday.

Last December the stock traded at more than $11 per share. On Monday NWA stock was slightly over $4 per share.

Look at the insider selling over the past couple of months, said Jim Corridore, Standard & Poor’s airlines equity analyst. That’s very alarming.

It also seems to excite a few brave souls.

Connecticut-based hedge fund SAC Capital Advisors recently bought 4.9 million shares, or 5.7 percent of Northwest’s shares, betting that Northwest will both survive and thrive.