Marvell director Michael Strachan paid a total of $148,500 for 10,000 shares, an average of $14.85 each, on Dec. 20, according to a form he filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Robert Switz, chairman of Micron Technology (MU) and a Marvell director, bought 2,500 Marvell shares for $37,025 the following day, Dec. 21, paying $14.81 a share.

Strachan's open-market purchase of Marvell stock was his first, and was the first by any Marvell insider since March 2011. Strachan's purchase may seem to be one of the smaller of such transactions in the world of publicly traded companies, but it is the largest buy in terms of total price by a Marvell insider since at least 2003, which is as far back as the company's online SEC records cover. Marvell's initial public offering was in June 2000.