--- title: "Lattice's CEO bought $1 million of his own stock two days after the 118% quarter" description: "Ford Tamer's November 4 Form 4 shows three open-market purchases at rising prices with no Rule 10b5-1 plan marked, doubling his family trust's holding. The record quarter beneath them was funded with $869 million of new debt, and every other named Lattice insider spent 2026 selling." publisher: "The Inference" section: "Chips" published: 2026-11-05T00:08:01.099Z modified: 2026-11-05T00:08:01.099Z canonical: https://theinference.org/article/lattice-s-ceo-bought-1-million-of-his-own-stock-two-days-after-the-118-quarter language: en keywords: "Chips, Earnings, Insider Trading, Lattice Semiconductor" --- # Lattice's CEO bought $1 million of his own stock two days after the 118% quarter > Ford Tamer's November 4 Form 4 shows three open-market purchases at rising prices with no Rule 10b5-1 plan marked, doubling his family trust's holding. The record quarter beneath them was funded with $869 million of new debt, and every other named Lattice insider spent 2026 selling. ## The buy was his call, down to the hour [Ford Tamer](https://theinference.org/markets/people/ford-tamer), two years into the top job at [Lattice Semiconductor](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/lattice-semiconductor) (Nasdaq: LSCC), an Oregon maker of low-power programmable chips for AI servers, spent about $1.0 million of his own cash on his own stock on November 4 [6]. [The Form 4](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/855658/000143774926034881/0001437749-26-034881-index.htm) landed at 2:35 p.m [1][5]. Eastern, before the close: three open-market lots totaling 9,790 shares at weighted averages of $101.78, $102.71 and $103.40, fills running from $101.19 to $103.56 [1][5]. He bought in tranches through a rising price, and the box for a Rule 10b5-1 pre-set trading plan is unchecked [1]. The day, the size and the pace were his call. ## A doubled trust, a round-tripped stock The purchase took a family trust from 10,000 shares to 19,790, roughly doubling it, against 315,677 shares held separately, a stake worth about $34 million at his fill [1][5]. The insider log back to late 2024 shows one other open-market purchase by any [Lattice](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/lattice-semiconductor) insider: [Tamer](https://theinference.org/markets/people/ford-tamer) again, 30,000 shares at $63.07 on November 6, 2025 [5]. That entry more than doubled by the June peak of $155.27, then round-tripped to about $102, where he bought again [4][5]. ## A record quarter, borrowed into being The quarter beneath was a record and a warning at once. [Revenue for the period ended October 3 hit $291.0 million](https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/articles/lattice-semiconductor-reports-record-3q26-210000005.html), up 118.3% year over year, with non-GAAP earnings of $0.72 a share and fourth-quarter guidance of $325–345 million [2]. But AMI, a server-firmware business Lattice closed on July 27 for $971.3 million, supplied $39.1 million of that and left $869.1 million of long-term debt where January had none [2]. GAAP net income was $11.2 million, 3.9 cents of every revenue dollar [2]. *Chart: **Revenue bottomed at $117M, then ran to a record $291M in two years** Line chart of Lattice Semiconductor quarterly revenue from Q3 2023 to Q3 2026, falling to a trough near $117 million in late 2024 then rising to a record $291 million* *Quarterly revenue in millions of dollars, fiscal quarters, from Lattice's SEC filings; Q3 2026 from the November 2, 2026, earnings release. [8][2]* *Chart: **Debt sat under $40M for twelve quarters; the AMI quarter took it to $869M** Line chart of Lattice Semiconductor's debt by fiscal quarter from Q3 2023 to Q3 2026, holding between $9 million and $36 million for twelve quarters before jumping to $869 million* *Debt in millions of US dollars, fiscal quarters, from Lattice's SEC filings; Q3 2026 long-term debt of $869.1 million from the November 2, 2026, earnings release. The $971.3 million AMI acquisition closed July 27, 2026. [9][2]* ## Twenty-nine sales, then one buy Strip AMI out and revenue still grew about 89%, with FPGA chips alone up 90% to $252 million, so the rebound is more than accounting [2][6]. The insider ledger is the sharper exhibit: [twenty-nine insider sales](http://openinsider.com/LSCC) at Lattice in 2026 through September, zero purchases, among them $2.1 million sold by strategy chief [Esam Elashmawi](https://theinference.org/markets/people/esam-elashmawi) in August and $3.5 million in March [5]. Tamer's own trades before this week were sales, a $321,000 lot in March and a July disposal his filings mark as tax withholding [5][7]. ## The other camp owns the tape The bears have the chart: the stock [jumped 13.3% the morning after the print](https://markets.financialcontent.com/stocks/article/stockstory-2026-11-3-why-is-lattice-semiconductor-lscc-stock-rocketing-higher-today), to $107.42, and still sits about 31% below June's high after an October selloff Tamer himself called out on the call, saying the market is "very skittish right now" [4][6]. One figure circulating against the stock, a 38% cut to Lattice's holding in iShares' robotics and AI ETF, could not be checked against the fund's own data this week, so it stays out of this ledger. And $1 million is 3% of the CEO's position, a statement about timing more than size. ## The ledger, not the tape Management's case is booked, not hoped for: backlog the CEO says extends "well past 2027 into 2028," and 2027 growth guided at no less than 60% [6]. The bears' case is a 3.9% GAAP margin carrying $869 million of debt [2]. The next tell is the ledger, not the tape: fourth-quarter results against $335 million at the midpoint, and the Form 4 log showing whether Lattice's next insider buys or keeps selling [2]. ## Takeaway Tamer's second open-market buy doubles his family trust days after a record quarter carried by $869 million of new AMI debt, while 29 insiders sold in 2026; Q4 revenue against the $335 million midpoint is the next tell. ## Sources 1. [SEC Form 4, Lattice Semiconductor Corp (Ford Tamer), filed 4 November 2026](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/855658/000143774926034881/0001437749-26-034881-index.htm) 2. [Business Wire via Yahoo Finance, "Lattice Semiconductor Reports Record 3Q26 Revenue, Up 118% YOY", 2 November 2026](https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/articles/lattice-semiconductor-reports-record-3q26-210000005.html) 4. [StockStory via FinancialContent, "Why is Lattice Semiconductor (LSCC) stock rocketing higher today", 3 November 2026](https://markets.financialcontent.com/stocks/article/stockstory-2026-11-3-why-is-lattice-semiconductor-lscc-stock-rocketing-higher-today) 5. [OpenInsider, LSCC insider trading screener (SEC Form 4 data), accessed 4 November 2026](http://openinsider.com/LSCC) 6. [Benzinga via MSN, "Lattice Semiconductor Q3 2026 earnings call transcript", 2 November 2026](https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/technology/lattice-semiconductor-q3-2026-earnings-call-transcript/ar-AA2gCjsT) 7. [The Motley Fool via Yahoo Finance, "Lattice Semiconductor CEO Ford Tamer Sells Shares", 14 July 2026](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/lattice-semiconductor-ceo-ford-tamer-191602555.html) 8. [Lattice Semiconductor quarterly figures from its SEC filings, retrieved 4 November 2026](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0000855658) 9. [Lattice Semiconductor, quarterly figures from its SEC filings, retrieved 4 November 2026](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0000855658) --- Lattice's CEO bought $1 million of his own stock two days after the 118% quarter — The Inference. Canonical: https://theinference.org/article/lattice-s-ceo-bought-1-million-of-his-own-stock-two-days-after-the-118-quarter