AGNC Investment Corp. is a publicly traded REIT focused on residential housing. The company's investment portfolio consists of agency mortgage-backed securities (MBS) managed on a leveraged basis. The company uses an actively managed portfolio and hedging strategies with the goal of preserving net asset value in different interest rate scenarios.

Insider-sentiment data provided by Vickers Stock Research continues to show that insiders have taken to the sidelines. Yes, earnings season (when insiders are restricted from trading) is a factor. But a toppy stock market at a time when the newsflow is volatile is almost assuredly a contributor. So how does the data from Vickers stack up against actual market activity? Pretty well, we think. Over the past month -- taking into account a few weeks when insiders could trade ahead of earnings season and the past two weeks of the trading lull -- the S&P 500 has been as flat as a pancake and the Nasdaq Composite is off about 1.5%. Not a bad time to be neutral. On a sector basis, the group with the weakest eight-week sell/buy ratio from Vickers is Information Technology, and that sector (using the IYW ETF) is off about 2% over the last month. The sector with the best eight-week sell/buy ratio is Energy, and that sector (using the IYE ETF) is up 9% over the last month. Digging deeper on Vickers' sector data, four sectors currently have bullish one-week sell/buy ratios, five are neutral, and two are bearish. Of the bullish sectors, Healthcare (which had the greatest level of activity across all sectors this week) was joined by the Financial, Materials, and Consumer Staples. The neutral sector are Communication Services, Energy, Industrial, Information Technology, and Real Estate. The two sectors that are bearish are Consumer Discretionary and Utilities. These results had little impact on the eight-week sector sell/buy ratios, which are unchanged from last week and where only Information Technology is bearish. This week, analysts at Vickers highlighted insider transactions of interest at Liquidia Corp. (NCM: LQDA) and Travel + Leisure Co. (NYSE: TNL).

AGNC Investment Corp. is a publicly traded REIT focused on residential housing. The company's investment portfolio consists of agency mortgage-backed securities (MBS) managed on a leveraged basis. The company uses an actively managed portfolio and hedging strategies with the goal of preserving net asset value in different interest rate scenarios.

AGNC Investment Corp. is a publicly traded REIT focused on residential housing. The company's investment portfolio consists of agency mortgage-backed securities (MBS) managed on a leveraged basis. The company uses an actively managed portfolio and hedging strategies with the goal of preserving net asset value in different interest rate scenarios.