Shares shovelled into a white-hot market

Directors continued this week shovelling shares into a market hungry for equities, with the scorecard registering $82 million to about $5 million in favour of the sellers.

More directors are choosing to explain why they've sold.

Take James Spenceley, the chief of Vocus Communications.

He disposed of $2.4 million of stock and said he wanted people to know that the proceeds enabled him to complete a residential property settlement.

"Mr Spenceley has advised the company that he has no present intention to make any further shares sales," a statement said.

Various directors of Syrah Resources sold more than $22 million of paper and Paul Kehoe, the managing director, said the recent inclusion of the shares in an exchange index was strong recognition by the market of the value of the company's graphite and vanadium projects.

The directors sold their option holdings and a "very small portion" of their shareholdings to a "significant institutional investor".

"The directors believe that this partial sell-down will assist in furthering the advancement of the company's free float, share trading liquidity, cash reserves and to continue to build and diversify its share register."

Elsewhere, Geoffrey Frederick Lord collected $2 million when he sold scrip in UXC, an information technology concern.

It was, he said, a restructure and reorganisation of entities within his business empire.

"The company notes that this is the first sale of UXC shares ever undertaken by Mr Lord since the formation of UXC in 2002," a statement said, and added that he remained a committed shareholder with a 5.4 per cent stake.

Woolworths numbers man Thomas Pockett once again filed a notice that failed to disclose the price of the shares he sold - worth about $4.3 million - after exercising options.

He said he had sold to fund the options' exercise price and to pay tax.

Iluka Resources chief David Robb said he had sold $1.4 million of shares to pay tax and to meet other commitments.