An interesting new pitch from Michael Brush, editor of Cabot's Insider Edge newsletter.

The strategy is simple, find stocks that have been beaten down, but where executives are stepping in and buying meaningful amounts of shares with their own money.

Why? Insiders can sell stock for a hundred reasons, but there's usually only one reason they buy...they think it's going higher. Brush says he's found three beaten-down stocks where insiders recently bought a combined $11.3 million.

#1 Cardinal Infrastructure (CDNL). This is the biggest insider bet of the three. After disappointing earnings helped send the stock down nearly 50% from its June high, insiders reportedly stepped in with roughly $8.1 million in purchases. Cardinal provides site preparation and infrastructure construction, giving it exposure to development and the broader infrastructure buildout.

The stock now trades around 18x forward earnings, after getting caught up in the same infrastructure enthusiasm, and subsequent selloff, as Sterling Infrastructure. The interesting part is the timing...Investors were selling. Insiders were buying millions.

#2 Fiserv (FISV). This might be the most interesting turnaround play. Fiserv has fallen roughly 60% over the past year as growth slowed and investors became concerned about its Clover payments business and heavy spending needed to restore growth, but the underlying business still generates roughly 80% recurring revenue.

A new CEO arrived this summer, insiders have purchased around $2.2 million in shares, and the stock has been beaten down to only about 7x forward earnings. That's extremely cheap if management can get growth moving again. The question is whether this is a temporarily broken compounder or a business whose competitive advantage has weakened.

#3 Energy Fuels (UUUU). The speculative pick. Energy Fuels gives investors exposure to two strategically important commodities, uranium and rare earths. AI electricity demand and the nuclear revival could create another leg higher for uranium demand, while Washington increasingly wants domestic sources of critical minerals.

The CEO recently made roughly a $1 million personal purchase of UUUU shares, apparently the company's largest insider purchase ever. But there's considerably more risk here as mining is capital intensive, uranium prices are volatile, and Energy Fuels is spending heavily to expand both uranium and rare-earth operations.

My take, I actually like the philosophy behind this strategy. Don't simply look for insider buying, look for beaten-down stock that is potentially recoverable business with unusually large insider purchases after the decline.

Of these three, CDNL is probably the most interesting combination of growth, valuation and insider conviction. FISV is the deep-value turnaround at only ~7x forward earnings, and UUUU is the high-risk uranium/rare-earth speculation.

CDNL probably catches my attention the most, but Fiserv at 7x earnings is hard to ignore.

Which would you rather follow insiders into: CDNL, FISV or UUUU?