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20 December 2025
By Maynard Paton
I can’t be the only investor who likes to see directors aligned with ordinary shareholders by owning lots of stock.
Hence this revisit to an old screen to identify companies offering robust financials, respectable growth, a reasonable valuation… and useful insider ownership.
The exact criteria I redeployed for this search were:
- Net borrowings less total leases of no more than zero (i.e. a net cash position excluding IFRS 16 lease obligations);
- An operating margin of 20% or more;
- A five-year uplift to operating profit of at least 50%;
- A forecast P/E of 20 or less, and;
- The board owning at least 10% of the company.
I applied the screen the other day and ShareScope returned only six matches:
I selected GlobalData because:
- The £770 million market cap was the largest on the list;
- The 64% board shareholding was the largest on the list, and;
- The shares were trading 56% below their five-year high.
ShareScope reveals the board’s huge shareholding is held by GlobalData’s chief executive, Michael Danson:
Mr Danson’s stake is currently worth approximately £500 million, and was worth more than £1 billion last year when GlobalData’s shares reached 240p:
Mr Danson might well be very motivated to return to billionaire status, or at least be very motivated not to see his immense wealth deteriorate further.
Let’s take a closer look.
Read my full GLOBALDATA article for ShareScope >>Maynard Paton
