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Abacus financial director Peter Griffiths-Jones has been keeping up the pace with his share buying. He followed up February's purchases with several more in March, bringing his stake up to 4.4 per cent, compared with 3.4 per cent at the turn of the year.

Griffiths-Jones bought in slugs of 17,500, 25,000, and then 4,800 shares, at 315-328p on 11, 12 and 18 March respectively.

The electronic component distributor, formerly known as Abacus Polar, said in January that, despite difficult conditions, it was in line to meet market expectations. Analysts expect £8-9 million pre-tax profits, with earnings per share of 13-15p, putting the shares on a prospective p/e of around 23 at the recent price of 327.5p.

Tech showings

Several directors of software and services firm Anite have also been busy putting their money where their mouths are. Chairman Alec Daly has picked up 10,000, chief executive John Hawkins and financial director Simon Hunt both bought 25,000, while senior non-executive Graham Caleb has doubled his stake with an extra 15,700 shares. They were priced at between 188.5p and 124.5p.

The board of Applied Optical Technologies made a similar collective show of confidence. Five directors entered the market, picking up a total of 112,000 shares, priced at 51p.

Redbus Interhouse executive chairman John Porter, managing director Kevin Neal and non-executive Tony Simkin have been adding to their stakes, spending a total of £60,000 for shares at 8.25p.

At Aim-listed electronics firm Elektron, non-executive John Skailes has been busy picking up a total of 250,000 shares at 8-10p, driving up the price in the process.

The company, previously called Bulgin after its founding family, is due to report its final results soon. House broker Teather & Greenwood expects a £500,000 loss in what are very difficult times for most of the company's markets.

Russian intervention

Russian oil producer Sibir Energy has been making some excellent-looking strides in Siberia, although its shares have remained stuck at around the 11p mark. This can be put down to Russia's recent history as a veritable minefield for Western oil firms, which were once falling over themselves to exploit the bounteous fields out there.

The company trumpets its Russian shareholders and board members as one of the main reasons for its success. One of these, Vadim Millstein, recently upped his stake by 350,000 shares at 10.25p, for a 3 million holding.

Everard Goodman, chairman and managing director of shopping centre investor Tops Estates, has been buying much bigger, picking up an extra 250,000 shares, at 178p, for his company Comet Investments.

Summers' first bow

Among other buying activity, Hercules Property Services' Robert Plumb has bought 3,000 shares at £4.20, while Young's Roy Summers has picked up his first holding in the brewer and pub operator, buying up 8,000 shares at £7 apiece.

Meanwhile Ian Stuart, chief executive of restructuring building materials group Heywood Williams, used his cash bonus for the year passed to buy another 35,739 shares at 230p each. He was awarded more than twice the number of options a few days before.

Other buys have been spotted at 365 Corporation, Druck, Southern Vectis, and Profile Media, among others.

Intelliplus minus

There is no buying at Aim-listed corporate telecoms operator Intelliplus, where director and founder Alan Abraham has sold 40 million shares at 0.5p to broker Hoodless Brennan to help pay off outstanding settlements with its network services supplier.

This follows Intelliplus's decision to terminate the contract – due to run for another four years – with monthly payments of £50,000.

The company, which had virtually no liquid reserves at its interim stage last September and has been issuing extra shares to pay off its creditors, is still valued at £19 million by the market.

Brian Basham, non-executive at Mezzanine, Smollenskys' beleaguered restaurant/bar operator, sold 900,000 shares in the company, each now valued at 14.5p, apparently 'to fund an imminent tax demand'.

Environmental support company RPS (see page 16) saw an injection of 211,780 shares into the market as four of its directors exercised options and promptly sold them.