Top 10 Stocks With Big Insider Buying, Buybacks

Next is Chesapeake Energy(CHK Quote). The oil and natural gas company hit our radar screen after CEO Aubrey McClendon recently purchased 101,500 shares for about $3.5 million.

The first thing you may notice in looking at Chesapeake is that it recently said its first-quarter net earnings plummeted more than 60% from last year. Chesapeake attributed the decline in profits to shrinking exploration-and-production margins and a $193 million charge from a mark-to-market hedging program.

Excluding the charge, Chesapeake earned $425 million, or 87 cents a share, in the quarter. On that basis, analysts at Thomson Financial were expecting 78 cents. So the company's adjusted profits still exceeded expectations.

UBS also reiterated its buy rating and raised its price target to $46 from $43 as well as its 2007 EPS estimates, to $7.40 from $7.20.

Another positive for the company is that it recently announced it had acquired an additional 8,500 net acres in the core of the Barnett Shale in Tarrant County, Texas, putting Chesapeake well on its way to the goal of 30,000 acres. A Wachovia Research analyst believes this purchase should continue to force share price higher seeing as Barnett continues to be the company's growth driver.

Despite the tough first-quarter earnings, the Oklahoma City-based company has returned 22% year to date, and analysts like ValuEngine see more upside to come. ValuEngine has issued a strong buy, a rating it doles out to only 2% of the 4,000 companies it covers. In issuing that strong buy, ValuEngine said of Chesapeake: "The company exhibits attractive company size, P/E ratio and risk."