A good bearish sign

In the Stock Market Wizards, Dana Galante mentions that high management turnover  is a good red flag that things are not hunky dory in the company.

This certainly holds true in the Indian context as well.

Consider for instance the aviation sector in India.Numerous CEOs have come and gone in Jet Airways,Kingfisher Airlines and Air India.This should have served as a good warning sign to investors to stay clear of the sector.

The resignation of the CFO/Compliance officer often indicates bearish times ahead for the stock.This is true for midcap and smallcap companies and not so much for A Group companies.

These officials are usually professionals (non promoters) and have no qualms in deserting a sinking ship !

Consider the following three examples:

CFO of MPS Ltd resigned on 15th Feb,2012.Since then, the stock is down 16%

CFO of Electrotherm resigned on 4th Feb, 2011.Since then, the stock is down 70%

Company Secretary of Clutch Auto resigned on 15th Nov, 2010.Since then, the stock is down 60%

No doubt market conditions had a role to play in the decline of the market caps of these companies.But the fact is these companies fell harder than the rest of the market as they were weaker fundamentally.

This is illustrated by the following example:

CFO of AshapurMin resigned on Dec 1, 2011.Despite Jan 2012 & Feb 2012 being very bullish months, this stock hit a 52 week low on 26 March, 2012-a fall of around 18%