Chief executive's wife buys more HMV shares

HMV chief executive Simon Fox's wife Clementine spent almost £100,000 lifting her stake in the CD and DVD retailer today.

She bought 92,667 shares at 107p a time, taking her holding to just under 185,000 shares. Combined with Simon Fox's holding of about 251,000 shares, the couple now have around just over 0.1% of the company.

Shares in the company fell Tuesday, as investors took profits after a strong set of full-year results. Profit before tax and exceptional items from continuing operations grew 25.2% to £56.6m in the year to 26 April 2008 from £45.2m the year before.

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During the period HMV concentrated on improving its website and trialling its 'next generation' store format, to be rolled out this year and next.

"One year into our transformation programme, we are ahead of where we had planned to be, although there remains much more for us to do," said Fox.

Top Director Buys

Thomson Reuters (TRIL)

Director name: Mr W. Geoffrey Beattie

Amount purchased: 168,000 @ 1,464.03p

Value: £2,459,570

Speedy Hire (SDY)

Director name: Mr Steve Corcoran

Amount purchased: 27,166 @ 559.00p

Value: £151,858

Speedy Hire (SDY)

Director name: Mr Michael McGrath

Amount purchased: 20,423 @ 559.00p

Value: £114,165

HMV Group (HMV)

Director name: Mr Simon Fox

Amount purchased: 92,667 @ 107.00p

Value: £99,154

Speedy Hire (SDY)

Director name: Mr Claudio Veritiero

Amount purchased: 16,532 @ 559.00p

Value: £92,414

Mano River Resources (MANA)

Director name: Mr David Barry Evans

Amount purchased: 200,000 @ 10.80p

Value: £21,600

Vertu Motors (VTU)

Director name: Mr Robert Forrester

Amount purchased: 70,000 @ 28.00p

Value: £19,600

Next (NXT)

Director name: Mr Jonathan Dawson

Amount purchased: 2,000 @ 832.00p

Value: £16,640

BSS Group (BTSM)

Director name: Mr Alan Ball

Amount purchased: 5,000 @ 279.50p

Value: £13,975

Mediterranean Oil & Gas (MOG)

Director name: Mr Anthony Augustine Trevisan

Amount purchased: 10,000 @ 138.00p

Value: £13,800

Top Director Sells

Veris (VERI)

Director name: Mr Martin McMahon

Amount sold: 300,000 @ 103.59p

Value: £310,770

Caledonia Investments (CLDN)

Director name: Major William Wyatt

Amount sold: 13,348 @ 1,812.50p

Value: £241,932

Speedy Hire (SDY)

Director name: Mr Steve Corcoran

Amount sold: 14,678 @ 563.00p

Value: £82,637

Speedy Hire (SDY)

Director name: Mr Claudio Veritiero

Amount sold: 2,049 @ 563.00p

Value: £11,536