Apple today announced that its Board of Directors has authorized an increase of more than 50 percent to the company’s program to return capital to shareholders. Under the expanded program, Apple plans to utilize a cumulative total of $200 billion of cash by the end of March 2017.
As part of the revised program, the Board has increased its share repurchase authorization to $140 billion from the $90 billion level announced last year. In addition, the company expects to continue to net-share-settle vesting restricted stock units.
The Board has also approved an increase of 11 percent to Apple’s quarterly dividend, and has declared a dividend of $.52 per share, payable on May 14, 2015 to shareholders of record as of the close of business on May 11, 2015.
From the inception of its capital return program in August 2012 through March 2015, Apple has returned over $112 billion to shareholders, including $80 billion in share repurchases.
To assist in funding the program, Apple plans to continue to access the domestic and international debt markets. The management team and the Board will continue to review each element of the capital return program regularly and plan to provide an update on the program on an annual basis.
“We believe Apple has a bright future ahead, and the unprecedented size of our capital return program reflects that strong confidence,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO, in a statement. “While most of our program will focus on buying back shares, we know that the dividend is very important to many of our investors, so we’re raising it for the third time in less than three years.”
Source: Apple Inc.
MacDailyNews Take: YKBAID.
Reminds me of our other favorite Apple acronym (well, other than AAPL). What if you could keep it running *and* return all of that money to shareholders?
Any opinion as to reinvesting dividends? Do most folks automatically reinvest or are people taking the dividends as cash?
If you reinvest, you get compounding, which is super powerful way to grow your wealth. Next time dividends roll around, you have more shares, which beget more dividends, which beget more shares, etc.
Yep I’ve been reinvesting dividends since they stated paying them. Let it ride.
I always reinvest since the holdings are in a 401K.
Only reason not to reinvest IMHO is if you are using dividends for income.
For long term holders compounding effect will become significant.
Depends on how many shares you have.
If you have accumulated over time and have a large position, you use the dividends as income.
It could be equal to a large salary 😊😊😊
The quarterly dividend per share will keep going up steadily as the stock price increases steadily. In ten years, just the recurring Apple dividend may be able to pay for my recurring personal expenses… 🙂
again with this silly buy back. if they want the stock price to go up, increase the dividend to $2.00 a share. being that apple owns a good bit of its stock, it would be paying itself and taxed at 15%. borrowing from peter to pay paul makes no sense. pay the taxes and pay the dividend. or, stop paying a dividend until there is $1,000,000,000,000 cash in the bank, then pay out all but 20% to shareholders of each quarter’s profit from that point on. that gives a cushion of 1 trillon dollars. the interest from that money and the quarterly profits should be given to stockholders.
I hope you’re not a CFA or CPA, etc. WRONG!
No, but he IS a certified and licensed troll.
so, let me get this straight, as a stockholder in a company you want none of the profits. hum, i’ve got some stock to sell you. or, perhaps you see the genius of borrowing money to pay someone when you have the money to pay other person. still live at home? or are you borrowing money from your parents so you can live in an apartment across town. that’s the way why spend your own money, you can use someone else’s.
well, i seems to me to be reasonable for a company to keep some money in reserve, but what g is talking about is true independence. if tim would have laid out a different plan like let’s say at 1 trillion dollars in cash in the bank, apple starts it’s own credit card company, or/and apple could build out it’s own cable, wireless, service, the car thing is just silly, and/or more solar with an eye, to produce 70% of america’s need.
all these new markets for apple, plus it’s revenue from it’s current products.
why would it not make sense for the owners to reap the reward? it seems some of you do not remember the lessons history has taught. there’s a reason for these old saying, “what goes up must come down”, “the public is fickle”, “people change their minds all the time”, “debt tightens a company”, “those who refuse to learn history are condemn to repeat it”.
so don’t be so quick to poo poo g thought.
an apple with 1 trillion in the bank could exit for a very long time after the public tires of iPhone, watches, iPads, etc. giving the company plenty of time to find the next big gold rush. or just grow in completely different areas. who know people might like to have a pet rock or even better an imaginer dog on a lease, even better furs, ties with fish on them that the next biggest thing. sorry i missed this one, no i mean the on, pat boone eight track tapes.
ask yourself what’s the end game with buying back shares. the company becomes private. i don’t think many people want to see the dell model. nor do i believe most want to see the a repeat of 80’s 90’s rjr/nabisco era, debt is good. if that’s the case every company after cost should pay out 75-80% of the profit to shareholders, that will keep a company tight, hungry…whatever else finance guys like to say.
Here’s a guy (or gal) who thinks Apple would be successful as a services company. Harharharhar
Do you have a shift key on your Android phone? Have you ever wondered what the key is that is marked “shift”? You could enhance your post’s optics by starting every sentence with a capital letter and use a capital letter for the pronoun “I” and also for company names. You don’t have to look as dumb as you sound.
200 billion … Thats aprox 25% of its market cap!
I dont believe many have a good grasp of what that means .yet ..
Its huge !
Ykbaid… What does it mean?
MDN – how about speaking English?!
You Know Because Apple Is Doomed
“…Apple plans to utilize…”, who chose to utilize utilize, and not to use use?
http://www.economist.com/news/business/21616968-companies-have-been-gobbling-up-their-own-shares-exceptional-rate-there-are-good-reasons
http://hotair.com/archives/2015/02/09/corporate-stock-buybacks-killing-the-economy/