After hours trading added insult to injury, as shares of GOOG continued to decline after the market closed today.
The fallout from a little miss in Google earnings, as they fell short of analyst expectations, triggered ‘Eject’ buttons throughout the trading world. On Monday, trading in Google nearly doubled its usual volume.
Google closed at $495.43, nearly a 4 percent drop in price. Their market cap dipped under $155 billion, far away from when they had challenged Microsoft in cap value.
As of 6:50 pm ET, after hours movement pushed shares down another $1.38. At the end of December 2007, Google closed at $691.48.
One might think this presents a growth opportunity, one that those closest to the company, its inner circle, might take advantage of by demonstrating confidence with a few buy orders.
Ho ho, don’t wait too long for those to appear. Since the beginning of 2008, several Google insiders, including outgoing CFO George Reyes, have sold 11,953 shares at prices ranging from $650.33 to $695.96 per share. Total take: $8,079,450.00.
Zero buys by the insiders, going all the way back to February 2007. Over the past 12 months, Google insiders parted with 1.278 million shares, reaping over $671 billion dollars. Nobody’s putting their money on Google from inside the company.
That makes us wonder what kind of help Google can offer Yahoo as it faces an unsolicited bid from Microsoft. It doesn’t look like Google’s going to put in a competing bid, even if the most optimistic person thinks it could get past antitrust regulators here or in the EU.
