Buyback Scorecard U.S. Share Buybacks Rebound but Face Sharp CriticismThe S&P 500 as Stock Repurchasers Industry Comparisons

The table below shows the 10 most and least effective stock buyback programs among the companies in the S&P 500 that bought back at least 4 percent or $1 billion of their shares from September 31, 2012 through September 31, 2014, according to their return on investment. As calculated by Fortuna Advisors, a New York City-based consultancy that compiled the data for Institutional Investor, buyback ROI measures the overall rate of return of these companies’ buybacks, based on the internal rate of return of the cash flows associated with them. Buyback strategy tracks the performance of the underlying stock in terms of annualized total shareholder return. Once Fortuna determines buyback ROI and buyback strategy, buyback effectiveness can then be calculated as simply the difference between the two, determined as compounded return.

The Best and Worst Corporate Stock Buyback Programs
Best
	Company	Industry	Market Cap ($ Millions)	Total Buyback (S Millions)	$ Total Buyback as % Market Cap	Buyback Strategy	Buyback Effectiveness	Buyback ROI
1	Southwest Airlines Co.	Transportation	23,137	1,370	5.9	84.7	8.0	99.5
2	Keurig Green Mountain	Food, Beverage and Tobacco	21,136	1,241	5.9	130.7	-15.9	94.1
3	Gilead Sciences	Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology and Life Sciences	160,917	4,131	2.6	84.8	-3.1	79.0
4	United Rentals	Capital Goods	10,655	517	4.9	84.3	-3.0	78.8
5	LyondellBasell Industries	Materials	55,670	3,449	6.2	61.8	1.5	64.2
6	SanDisk Corp.	Technology Hardware and Equipment	21,963	2,466	11.2	55.6	5.4	64.1
7	Western Digital Corp.	Technology Hardware and Equipment	22,735	1,663	7.3	62.5	0.6	63.6
8	Hewlett-Packard Co.	Technology Hardware and Equipment	66,197	4,260	6.4	42.8	11.2	58.8
9	Marriott International	Consumer Services	20,311	2,049	10.1	35.5	12.1	51.9
10	McKesson Corp.	Healthcare Equipment and Services	45,085	1,396	3.1	47.5	2.7	51.5
Worst
	Company	Industry	Market Cap ($ Millions)	Total Buyback (S Millions)	$ Total Buyback as % Market Cap	Buyback Strategy	Buyback Effectiveness	Buyback ROI
1	Coach	Consumer Durables and Apparel	9,811	750	7.6	-18.8	-15.6	-31.4
2	Whole Foods Market	Food and Staples Retailing	13,767	703	5.1	-8.5	-24.7	-31.1
3	Teradata Corp.	Software and Services	6,498	902	13.9	-23.0	8.0	-16.8
4	Mattel	Consumer Durables and Apparel	10,355	649	6.3	4.6	-17.8	-14.0
5	Fossil Group	Consumer Durables and Apparel	4,968	969	19.5	12.2	-17.6	-7.5
6	Staples	Retailing	7,795	508	6.5	2.0	-7.7	-5.9
7	Bed Bath & Beyond	Retailing	13,295	3,248	24.4	-1.1	-4.2	-5.2
8	Xilinx	Semiconductors and Semiconductor Equipment	11,370	570	5.0	17.3	-18.9	-4.8
9	Target Corp.	Retailing	39,721	2,106	5.3	0.9	-3.6	-2.7
10	The Mosaic Co.	Materials	16,638	2,508	15.1	-8.3	6.3	-2.5
Source: Fortuna Advisors Analysis using data from the Capital IQ database. Financial Data from September 2012 to September 2014. Includes the 491 members of the current S&P 500 that were public for the full period. Market Capitalization as of: 09/30/2014. Companies included here if $ Total Buyback / Market Capitalization is greater than 4% or if $ Total Buyback is greater than $1 billion.