KeyCorp Chief Information Officer Amy Brady sold $700,000 worth of KeyCorp stock amid a sell-off last week. Brady sold 45,000 shares of KeyCorp KEY, -3.26% at an average price of $15.58 on March 10, the company disclosed in a Tuesday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. “This was a pre-arranged trade and the timing was related to KeyCorp’s year-end compensation schedule and the vesting of its performance shares,” a KeyCorp spokesperson told MarketWatch. Brady was cleared to be traded with a valid trading window between March 8 and March 14. Brady “timed the sale really smartly,” said Ben Silverman, director of research at Veritidata, which tracks insider purchases. While KeyCorp shares sold off in all five sessions last week, including a sharp one-day drop of 7% on March 9 after the Silicon Valley bank’s troubles came to light, Brady sold 45,000 of his shares before the stock tumbled 27% on Monday, March 13. But Silverman Brady’s sale doesn’t necessarily seem problematic because his capacity as chief information officer puts him on the operational side of KeyCorp rather than the investment side. Brady was cleared to trade, indicating that those involved in such compliance clearances as determined at the time were not in possession of material non-public information. Silverman continued, when looking at recent insider activity among bank names, the sale of Brady’s stock “stands out simply because it’s an outlier”. He found about 105 companies, mainly small and medium-sized regional banks, to buy insiders with minimal sales. Elsewhere purchases by executives and directors appear to be aimed at sending a message that their shares are “oversold”. SEE MORE: Charles Schwab CEO and other insiders get nearly $7 million in stock amid sale Read: Fifth third board member collapses after buying $1.3 million worth of stock Brady received only 49,000 shares after vesting two batches of restricted stock in February, withholdings calculated to cover tax liabilities, he said. She owned about 119,000 shares after her sale last week, according to an SEC filing. A KeyCorp spokesperson said that as part of the company’s policies for all executives, “Amy is subject to minimum share ownership requirements equal to three times her base salary.”
