TransAlta's headquarters in Calgary in April, 2014. TransAlta Corp. is one of Canada’s largest publicly traded power generators.Larry MacDougal/The Canadian Press
We always like to see a chief financial officer buying company shares, and this screen takes on extra appeal in today’s high-rate environment. Interest rates have been rising over the past month after a hawkish speech by U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh in August. Rising rates can pose a headwind to stocks as bonds start to compete more strongly for capital. They can also challenge company cash flows owing to higher interest expense and pricer credit conditions for customers.
If a CFO buys despite rising interest costs, it signals that the person with the best handle on a company’s books is confident that the business’s growth prospects remain intact. With that in mind, we highlight three companies where the CFO has been buying shares in the public market.
Leading the CFO buying over the past month is Blair Zaritsky at copper mine developer Osisko Metals Inc. Mr. Zaritsky bought 130,000 shares at $1.58 on Sept. 1, an investment of about $205,000. Building a large open-pit mine requires heavy upfront capital, and higher borrowing costs raise the hurdle for development financing while reducing the present value of cash flows that may be years away. As it turns out, investors appear willing to fund industrial mining despite higher rates, as a wholly-owned Osisko Metals critical minerals subsidiary recently upsized a special warrant offering to $250-million from $100-million.
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Osisko Metals Inc. is advancing the Gaspé Copper project, a past-producing mine near Murdochville in Quebec’s Gaspé Peninsula that the company describes as the largest undeveloped copper resource in eastern North America. The deposit hosts measured and indicated resources of 1.83 billion tonnes, averaging 0.32 per cent copper equivalent.
TransAlta Corp. is one of Canada’s largest publicly traded power generators and makes extensive use of debt. On June 3 it agreed to buy two contracted gas peaking plants near Denver from Blackstone for US$1-billion, which includes the assumption of US$750-million of project debt. The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter. It caught our attention that CFO Mike Politeski bought 5,000 shares at $16.02 on Sept. 15. He is relatively new to the job, replacing Joel Hunter, who moved to the position of CEO on April 30. Since May 13, Mr. Politeski has purchased a total of 45,000 shares in the public market.
With its second-quarter results, TransAlta reaffirmed its 2026 guidance, which calls for free cash flow of $1.18 to $1.51 per share. At Mr. Politeski’s purchase price of $16.02, the stock traded at about 12 times the midpoint of that range ($1.345). His most recent purchase also comes as the stock trades near its 52-week low of $15.62. The past couple of years have been tough for TransAlta, with adjusted EBITDA falling to $1.104-billion in 2025 from $1.255-billion a year earlier, and investors are not betting on a turnaround. For contrarians with multiyear time horizons, seeing the new CFO consistently adding to his holdings is a positive sign.
TransAlta is in the middle of the pack of our in-house INK Edge ranking system, which incorporates valuations, insider commitment and price momentum. For the shares to move up our rankings, we would need to see more insider buying from senior officers or directors, or begin to see the stock outperforming the broad market on at least a three-month basis.
Whereas TransAlta is a contrarian situation, NFI Group Inc. is a momentum story. The bus maker’s shares are up 54.6 per cent so far this year as of Friday. In such a situation, we would not be surprised to see insiders taking profits. Instead, on Sept. 2, CFO Brian Dewsnup bought 2,000 shares at $23.29. Other insiders have also been buying. Over the past six months, seven insiders, including Mr. Dewsnup, have spent just over $2.1-million buying shares in the public market, while two insiders sold a total of $690,323 worth of stock.
In a high-rate environment, NFI Group is fortunate to be serving the public transportation sector, which is largely insensitive to interest rates. Nevertheless, debt is a significant part of the company’s capital structure, and interest expense has been rising. Interest and finance costs in the second quarter jumped about 34 per cent from a year earlier. Moreover, the company has to contend with rising tariffs. Through it all, we can take encouragement from the fact that insiders, including the CFO, have been buying.
The chart shows insider public market transactions in Canadian dollars. Any U.S. dollar-denominated trades are converted at the daily Bank of Canada rate.
Ted Dixon is CEO of INK Research, which provides insider news and knowledge to investors.