Director dealings: Paragon's new COO builds stake

Paragon Entertainment's recently appointed chief operating officer John Dobson made his third share purchase this month as the lowly priced visitor attraction construction specialist climbs back towards yearly highs.

Dobson, an accountant who was hired in May, bought 773,503 shares at a price of 2.32p, following his purchase of 4.6m shares on Tuesday at 2.17p and 1.1m at an average of 1.83p on 1 August.

Together these purchases, which has cost him around £139,000, have given Dobson a holding of 9.2m shares, representing 4.9% of the company's total.

Paragon, which designs and builds visitor attractions and experiences, lifted revenues 22% to £5.5m and underlying operating profits tenfold to £106,000 in the half-year to 30 June, a period that saw it complete projects including for Hamleys Prague, 'Land of the Lions' at London Zoo, 'The Rolling Stones Exhibitionism' at the Saatchi Gallery, 'Centre for Life' at Newcastle, 'Ninja' at Portsmouth Boathouse and 'Thomas Land' at Drayton Manor.

Management said they remained confident about the outlook for the rest of the year, with a committed pipeline of £16.5m throughout 2016 and 2017.

Top Director Buys

Bank Of America Corp. (BAC)
Director name: Moynihan,Brian T
Amount purchased: 28,770 @ $15.02
Value: $432,125.41

Paragon Entertainment Ltd (di) (PEL)
Director name: Dobson,John
Amount purchased: 773,503 @ 2.32p
Value: £17,918.97

Personal Assets Trust (PNL)
Director name: Angus,Robin John
Amount purchased: 3 @ 39,789.00p
Value: £1,193.67