The scorecard registered $5.4 million to $6.4 million in favour of sellers.

Directors again bought scrip which had been heavily discounted.

A further three directors from the Santos boardroom joined the party; Hock Goh, Yasmin Allen and Roy Franklin between them outlaid $218,178.

In a rare display of almost total boardroom support for a beaten-up corporate heavyweight - Scott Sheffield remaining on the sidelines - nine of the 10 person board between them have spent about $745,000.

The shares closed on Friday at $7.99, which means the directors are all ahead of the game so far.

Also reflecting the skittish nature of the market was Robert Millner's buying of TPG Telecom shares: one day he paid $7.30 a share, while four days later he outlaid $6.59 a share.

Meanwhile, Flight Centre - which was fetching close enough to $41 at the beginning of the month - was given a severe hiding with the selling stick after a downgrade.

The scrip was promptly marked down from $35.67 to $31.41 on Thursday, whereupon non-executive director Robert Baker doubled his stake, paying $32.17.

Flight Centre's crime was to forecast pre-tax underlying earnings of either plus or minus 4 per cent on the record 2013-2014 result of $376.5 million.

But the aforementioned falls were of the garden variety compared with Paladin Energy, a uranium producer.

In 2011, the scrip was fetching $5 apiece; the shares are now at 31¢, valuing the group at about $508 million.

The company has just finished a 26¢-a-share recapitalisation capital raising.

Non-executive director Wendong Zhang took up his entitlement and bought 1 million shares at 30¢ a share on the market.