Congress Net Buying: formula and how to read it

Purchases minus sales of the stock by members of Congress in 90 days. Purchases minus sales of the stock reported by US senators and representatives, counting each reported trade once, with a transaction date in the last 90 days. Members have up to 45 days to report, so the latest weeks are usually incomplete, and amounts are reported only as ranges, so dollars are not added up. Only stock purchases and sales count (not options, bonds, funds or exchanges). Filter-only, so it is never scored.

Stock Meadow groups it under Company, and shows it in tables as Congress net.

Congress net buying = number of reported purchases − number of reported sales of the stock, with a transaction date in the last 90 days

Four reported purchases and one reported sale of a stock in the last 90 days give a net of +3. The numbers are made up for illustration.

Positive means more purchases than sales and negative means more sales. Zero means no trades, or an equal number of each. A handful of trades by a few people is a small sample, so treat it as one more clue rather than a signal on its own.

When Stock Meadow ranks stocks, a higher figure scores better.

• Reports lag. A member has up to 45 days to disclose a trade, so the latest weeks are usually incomplete and the count can change after the fact.
• It counts trades, not dollars. Members report only a range (for example $1,001 to $15,000), so Stock Meadow shows the range but does not add amounts up.
• Trades by a spouse or child count too, and a managed account may trade without the member's input. Only stock purchases and sales are counted, not options, bonds, funds or exchanges.

How Stock Meadow handles gaps. Usually blank when trade data hasn't been loaded for the stock yet (a recent addition).

Treat any single metric as one clue, and read the company's financial statements before drawing a conclusion. Stock Meadow's figures are research tools based on reported data, not investment advice.

No scoring model uses it. It is a filter and a table column only.

Read about every scoring model on the scoring models page.

• Insider Net Buying: insiders' open-market buying minus selling over 90 days, as a share of the company's value.
• Number of Insiders Buying: how many different insiders bought shares on the open market in 90 days.
• P/E Ratio (Price-to-Earnings): what you pay for each dollar of profit.

How soon are trades by members of Congress reported?

The STOCK Act requires a report within 30 days of the member learning of a trade and no later than 45 days after it happened. Stock Meadow reads the Senate and House disclosures every day.

Why can I only filter on Congress net buying, not score it?

A few trades by a few lawmakers, reported weeks late, are too thin to rank thousands of stocks fairly, so Stock Meadow lets you filter on it and show it as a column but never scores it.

Is a higher or lower Congress net better?

When Stock Meadow ranks stocks, a higher figure scores better. That is a ranking convention, so read Congress net alongside other measures and compare similar companies.

Why is Congress net blank for some stocks?

It is usually blank when trade data hasn't been loaded for the stock yet (a recent addition). Stock Meadow leaves the figure blank rather than guessing it.