In a victory for common sense, the trading behavior of company executives, directors, and large shareholders in the stocks of firms they're registered "insiders" at have been proven profitable to monitor by both academic studies and (more importantly) the experience of your fellow professional investors.

Below are lists of the top 10 mainly open-market insider purchases and sales filed at the Securities and Exchange Commission Thursday, Jan. 24, 2013 as ranked by dollar value.

Please note, however, that these are factual lists, not buy and sell recommendations. Dollar value is only one metric to assess the importance of an insider transaction, and, frankly, often not even the most important metric that determines if an insider transaction is significant.

In purchases, Christopher Cline, a Principal at Natural Resource Partners LP (NYSE:NRP), bought $14,999,992 worth of company stock. The Twin Haven Special Opportunity Fund III, a Beneficiary Owner of Hawaii's dominant local telephone company, Hawaiian Telcom (NASDAQ:HCOM), bought $318,684 worth of company stock. Glenn Simmons, a Director of titanium dioxide manufacturer and marketer Kronos Worldwide (NYSE:KRO), bought $194,575 worth of company stock.

In sales, Northern Tier Holdings LLC, a Director and Beneficiary Owner of Northern Tier Energy (NYSE:NTI), sold $250,599,344 of company stock. This follows news from last week of a public offering at the company of 10,700,000 common units. At professional social network LinkedIn (NYSE:LNKD), Vice President of Global Solutions Michael Gamson sold $4,260,154, while Director David Sze sold $1,898,632 worth of company stock. The Kellogg WK Fund Trust again sold Kellogg (NYSE:K), this time for $3,744,207. Thomas Kelleher, the President of Institutional Securities Division at Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) since January 1 of this year, sold $1,188,972 worth of company stock.

At InsiderInsights.com, we find new investment ideas just about every day using these and more intricate insider screens to determine where we should focus our subsequent fundamental and technical analysis. And while stocks don't (or shouldn't) move up or down based on insider activity alone, insiders tend to be good indicators of when real stock-moving events like earnings surprises, corporate actions, and new products may be in the offing.

For more on the unique screens Insider Insights uses to track insider sales and purchases, please see InsiderInsights.com.

Editor's note: Jonathan Moreland is the founder of Insider Insights and author of "Profit From Legal Insider Trading."