Tumi Insiders Looking to Sell More Than $230 Million in Stock

Tumi Holdings Inc. (NYSE: TUMI) may have reported a tenfold rise in net income and it may have raised its full-year guidance. The problem is that the company submitted a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission after what would have been the close of trading had the markets been open Monday for insiders to unload shares of stock. The filing is for up to 10,100,000 shares of common stock in Tumi Holdings. All shares are being sold by insiders, so the company will not receive one dollar of the proceeds.

It is worth noting that the selling stockholders include certain Tumi officers and entities tied to the 2004 buyer named Doughty Hanson. Tumi shares are actually still slightly less than where they when they opened for trading out of the chute in April.

Tumi was slated to debut at $15 to $17 per share in the April IPO, but the stock priced at $18 per share and it hit $25.83 on the day it went public. Shares were crushed in the “sell in May and go away” trading period before the recovery.

The most recent share price was $23.71 per share, and the trading since the initial public offering has ranged from $14.44 to $28.70. By getting to sell above the IPO price, the sale makes sense for the owners. After the effect of the offering, the insiders and the officers and directors will still hold some 33,125,799 shares, or 48.8% of the shares beneficially owned after this offering.

JON C. OGG