A closed period is a stretch of time before a company publishes its results during which PDMRs are prohibited from dealing in its shares. The logic is straightforward: in the weeks before results, the people running the company know how the period went and the market doesn't.
The prohibition runs for a defined period immediately before the announcement of interim and year-end results. Companies frequently impose their own additional restrictions on top of the regulatory minimum, and many operate a policy of requiring clearance before any dealing at any time.
The practical consequence is visible in the data. Director buying is not spread evenly across the calendar — it bunches in the days and weeks after results are published, because that's when the window opens. A cluster of purchases immediately following an announcement is partly a signal about conviction and partly just the first opportunity anyone had.
That matters when you're reading timing. A purchase made the day after results is not necessarily more urgent than one made a month later; it may simply be the earliest legal moment. Purchases made deep into an open window, when the buyer could have acted weeks earlier and chose now, arguably say more.
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Information only, not investment advice.