Melody Birmingham, EVP & Group President of Utilities at NiSource Inc. (NI), has maintained a steady cadence of open-market purchases in First Bancorp/Southern First Bancshares (SRCE) while her NI activity has been dominated by compensation-driven transactions. Across 69 total Form 4 filings spanning two companies, Birmingham has executed 18 open-market buys totaling $99,555.22, with all but one of those purchases concentrated in SRCE. The SRCE buys follow a precise quarterly rhythm—roughly $2,800 to $3,500 per transaction on dates like February 14, May 15, August 15, and November 15—suggesting a systematic dividend reinvestment or scheduled accumulation program rather than opportunistic timing.
Her NI position tells a different story. The only open-market sales in the recent window occurred on May 14 and May 20, 2026, totaling $590,425 ($471,850 and $118,575, respectively). These sales stand in contrast to the bulk of her NI activity, which consists of automatic transactions: a February 27, 2026 award valued at $3.36 million, with $1.63 million in shares withheld for tax obligations (code F), plus a January 2026 grant of $320,017. The May sales are notable as the only discretionary NI dispositions in the dataset, but they represent a small fraction of her total acquired value of $3.7 million across both companies.
The overall pattern is one of disciplined accumulation in SRCE through small, recurring purchases, paired with large, non-discretionary NI equity compensation events punctuated by two recent sales. Birmingham’s recent 18-to-2 buy-to-sell ratio on open-market trades underscores a clear buying bias in her discretionary activity, even as the dollar-weighted picture is dominated by NI grants and tax withholdings. The SRCE purchases, while modest in size, demonstrate consistent conviction in that regional banking name, while the NI sales—timed in mid-May 2026—represent the only significant cash-out event in the trailing period.
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