Dallin Alldredge

When senior staff buy their own company’s shares during layoffs, they’re signaling that a turnaround will succeed. AP Photo/Richard Drew

Some kinds of insider trading are perfectly legal – and they offer useful signals about a company’s health

Corporate layoffs cause confusion about a business’s future, but there’s a way for investors and employees alike to see if downsizing could lead to profitability.
The most in-the-know insiders earned three times as much as the typical investor in any given month. Witthaya Prasongsin/Moment via Getty Images

Insider trading − the legal kind − is a lot more profitable if you work for a multinational company

Executives and other high-level inside traders at US companies with global sales earned about three times as much in a month as the average investor, a new study found.