SoFi Technologies Inc. Chief Executive Anthony Noto is continuing his buying spree, adding another $240,000 to the financial-technology company’s stock on Thursday amid pressure on banking names. Noto bought 45,000 shares of SoFi SOFI, -0.55% at an average price of $5.3936 on Thursday, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That purchase builds on $995,000 in stock purchases that Noto made on March 10 as SoFi’s stock plunged shortly after the Silicon Valley bank’s collapse. He then bought 180,000 shares at an average price of $5.5283. He bought about $1.24 million worth of stock during two March purchases. read more: SoFi CEO Noto buys ‘opportunistic’ million-dollar stock as SVB crisis fuels SoFi shares to close at $6.47 on March 8 – the last trading session before news of the Silicon Valley bank’s troubles spooked investors in the financial sector. Noto, a veteran of Twitter, Goldman Sachs and the National Football League, was also a big buyer of SoFi stock in December. That month, he bought $7.4 million worth of stock at a price just south of $4.60 a share. Sophie’s stock closed as high as $7.72 in early February. SoFi stock was trading at $5.40 during midday action on Friday. BUYING THE NOTES Executives and insiders at other financial firms have bought their beat-down shares amid SVB’s collapse. Ben Silverman, who tracks insider buys and sales as director of research at VerityData, told MarketWatch on Thursday that he has recently seen buys at 100 companies, mainly small and mid-sized regional banks. Some big name insiders have also gotten in on the action. Charles Schwab Corp. SCHW, -3.75% Chief Executive Walter Bettinger and a group of other executives and board members from the financial company spent about $7 million on stock purchases this week. And a board member of Fifth Third Bancorp FITB, -5.51% bought $1.27 million worth of stock in the Cincinnati-based banking-services company on March 13.
