A great case to see the absurdity of it is Intel, doing stock buybacks for almost a decade to push its stock price up while flailing around and losing its edge, if it was paying high dividends while flailing around then major shareholders would be asking why the fuck would they be paying dividends while the business is losing competitiveness but by doing stock buybacks it kept investors "happy" so they could jump ship and let the company fail on its own.
Stock buybacks have perverse incentives, everyone responsible for keeping the company in check gets a fat paycheck from buybacks: executives, major investors, etc., all financed by sucking the coffers dry. The buybacks at Intel just made the company as a whole lose money, they bought back stocks when they were high and it only dipped since then (10y window).
The idea that the stock market can only be used to flow shares in one direction has no merit. If you want to regulate executive compensation do that with direct clear regulation on executive compensation, not via some indirect rule change on the stock market.
This anti stock buyback meme is silly. It’s like people who are anti shorting stock. Companies list on the stock exchange in order to sell their own stock to raise capital. If they have excess capital, absolutely they should be able to buy back their stock. And buy other companies stock if they see it as undervalued also.
Only it damn well isn’t. Anywhere. Not even patient reports.
The problem with AI is if it’s right 90% of the time but I have to do all the work anyway to make sure it’s not one of the 10% of times it’s extremely confidently wrong, what use is it to me?