Top 10 Stocks With Big Insider Buying, Buybacks

Part of the philosophy behind Stockpickr.com is to follow in the footsteps of smart people.

This could mean piggybacking great investors like Warren Buffett or George Soros or it could mean following the lead of CEOs, employees and directors who are buying up shares of their companies. These are people who know the intimate details of their companies far better than you or me.

The perfect setup, however, is when one of these company insiders or an entire board -- in the case of a buyback -- are making long bets on the stock along with savvy investors.

With that in mind, each Thursday at Stockpickr we update the Top 10 Insider Purchases and Buybacks portfolio, featuring stocks that have had either big insider purchases or newly announced buybacks as well as super investors accumulating shares.

Charles Schwab(SCHW Quote) makes this week's list. The San Francisco brokerage firm recently said it will buy back more than 100 million shares, about 7% of the company's outstanding shares, and issue a special one-time dividend of $1 a share. The $3.5 billion buyback prices shares between $19.50 and $22.50 each.

In the first quarter Charles Schwab saw profit rise 12%, marking the eighth consecutive quarter of double-digit earnings growth, as it delivered $273 million, or 22 cents a share. The company expects another strong quarter with earnings of 23 cents a share when it reports second-quarter numbers the week of July 16.