It makes sense if they’re pulling out of the stock market entirely, in that case it’s just settling the books. Any other reason is to manipulate the price. The whole stock market is a house of cards controlled directly by a few self-titled elites though, so chicanery is literally built in and always was.
I agree. I could live with it if it were merely a way to defer taxes, but the U.S. has something called the stepped-up basis. This allows people to inherit stocks without paying tax on the capital gains. The wealthy can live their whole lives without paying any tax. Both stock buy-backs and the stepped-up basis severely undermine the stock market and tax system.
I am an MBA and agree that buybacks are fine. The problem is toxic anti-capitalism from my perspective. People are not really educated well on these topics. I find your comment funny that an army of accountants come to explain things and help everyone understand the nuances and why this is needed, but all the experts are somehow shills.
It’s not like capitalism is doing itself (or the 99%) any favors. When it’s blatantly clear that the ultra rich and short-term profit seeking are responsible for a lot of world problems (extreme pollution, climate change, corruption, being essentially immune to most laws), being “toxic anti-capitalist” is a natural step.
It’s very obviously is. Stock buybacks aren’t allowed almost anywhere else in the world for a reason. It just leads to terrible behavior. This coupled with insanely low effective corporate tax rates means companies horde capital and do buybacks instead of doing other activities that are more economically beneficial to the country. Like increasing worker pay…
If I’m being honest, I don’t understand this angle. Why are stock buybacks immoral or wrong? Isn’t it simply using extra cash in a company to buy back stock from shareholders? With the same demand and reduced total stock, of course the price is going to go up. But the total market capitalization remains the same. I don’t understand why this is somehow wrong. Can someone help me out?
Because executive pay is largely given in shares, so it incentivizes the leadership to invest funds in buy backs to inflate the price of the very shares they own instead of investing that money into employee pay or other company centric initiatives.
The other reply is correct regarding the macro effects of the practise. The more immediate issue is that it allows shareholders to avoid paying dividend taxes. So they can effectively defer paying taxes until they realise any capital gains. This is a huge benefit, as the present value of money is worth much more than the future value of money. However there is an even larger benefit in the U.S. Dependents can inherit stocks at the current price and avoid paying any capital gains tax. This is called the “stepped-up basis.” It’s an insane tax loophole. Together stock buy-backs and the stepped-up basis allow the ultra wealthy to pay little to no tax, ever. They take out perpetual loans to pay for living expenses, guaranteed against their holdings.
I agree. They need to do a reverse split if they want to change the shares in circulation.
The idea was a company could show faith by buying their own stock. Now ceo pay is tied to factors associated with the stock that can be manipulated by buying it back.
The IBM bro Ginny made millions while the company shrunk by manipulating the stock.
I don’t care what a ceo makes. I do care what they do. If they’re only focusing on themselves, I care.
Stock buybacks need to be made illegal again. I don’t understand how it’s anything other than market manipulation.
Ronald Regan really fucked this nation over. . .
He’s was the first paid actor, just a puppet so the people in control can remain unknown. Skull and bones secret society was/is a real thing.
Nixon never should have been pardoned
It makes sense if they’re pulling out of the stock market entirely, in that case it’s just settling the books. Any other reason is to manipulate the price. The whole stock market is a house of cards controlled directly by a few self-titled elites though, so chicanery is literally built in and always was.
I agree. I could live with it if it were merely a way to defer taxes, but the U.S. has something called the stepped-up basis. This allows people to inherit stocks without paying tax on the capital gains. The wealthy can live their whole lives without paying any tax. Both stock buy-backs and the stepped-up basis severely undermine the stock market and tax system.
The real parasites in society.
Thank you. And amazing to see you have positive upvotes.
Whenever someone makes a comment like this on reddit, an army of accounts would appear to downvote and argue against it.
I’m convinced the narrative on reddit is highly controlled on these kind of topics.
Either that, or the retards of WSB were the culprits and they haven’t found their way to lemmy yet.
Now that I think of it, perhaps those same accounts were used to manipulate retail traders on WSB… hmmm…
I am an MBA and agree that buybacks are fine. The problem is toxic anti-capitalism from my perspective. People are not really educated well on these topics. I find your comment funny that an army of accountants come to explain things and help everyone understand the nuances and why this is needed, but all the experts are somehow shills.
It’s not like capitalism is doing itself (or the 99%) any favors. When it’s blatantly clear that the ultra rich and short-term profit seeking are responsible for a lot of world problems (extreme pollution, climate change, corruption, being essentially immune to most laws), being “toxic anti-capitalist” is a natural step.
It’s very obviously is. Stock buybacks aren’t allowed almost anywhere else in the world for a reason. It just leads to terrible behavior. This coupled with insanely low effective corporate tax rates means companies horde capital and do buybacks instead of doing other activities that are more economically beneficial to the country. Like increasing worker pay…
If I’m being honest, I don’t understand this angle. Why are stock buybacks immoral or wrong? Isn’t it simply using extra cash in a company to buy back stock from shareholders? With the same demand and reduced total stock, of course the price is going to go up. But the total market capitalization remains the same. I don’t understand why this is somehow wrong. Can someone help me out?
Because executive pay is largely given in shares, so it incentivizes the leadership to invest funds in buy backs to inflate the price of the very shares they own instead of investing that money into employee pay or other company centric initiatives.
The other reply is correct regarding the macro effects of the practise. The more immediate issue is that it allows shareholders to avoid paying dividend taxes. So they can effectively defer paying taxes until they realise any capital gains. This is a huge benefit, as the present value of money is worth much more than the future value of money. However there is an even larger benefit in the U.S. Dependents can inherit stocks at the current price and avoid paying any capital gains tax. This is called the “stepped-up basis.” It’s an insane tax loophole. Together stock buy-backs and the stepped-up basis allow the ultra wealthy to pay little to no tax, ever. They take out perpetual loans to pay for living expenses, guaranteed against their holdings.
I agree. They need to do a reverse split if they want to change the shares in circulation.
The idea was a company could show faith by buying their own stock. Now ceo pay is tied to factors associated with the stock that can be manipulated by buying it back.
The IBM bro Ginny made millions while the company shrunk by manipulating the stock.
I don’t care what a ceo makes. I do care what they do. If they’re only focusing on themselves, I care.