In a recent press release it was published, the Apple company announced that it will start offering dividends to its shareholders and will initiate a program through which it will buy back some of the shares sold over time. This release is coming after the announcement made last night by Apple, the announcement by which we were informed that today we will find out how the company intends to use the monetary reserve of 100 billion dollars. It seems that 10 billion dollars will be spent on buying back the shares and the process will start on September 30, 2012 and will last no less than 3 years. Apple's fiscal year ends on September 30, 2012, so the process will begin with the 2013 fiscal year.
Additionally, the Company's Board of Directors has authorized a $10 billion share repurchase program commencing in the Company's fiscal 2013, which begins on September 30, 2012. The repurchase program is expected to be executed over three years, with the primary objective of neutralizing the impact of dilution from future employee equity grants and employee stock purchase programs.
In addition to the share buyback, Apple intends to offer quarterly dividends worth $2.65 per share to all its shareholders, so all those who have invested in Apple will start receiving their money back. Everything that Apple is doing now is in apparent contradiction with the way Steve Jobs led the Apple company over the years, but it is not known if he would have decided that these actions should be carried out after his death. In the end, we learn that 45 billion dollars will be spent in the new plan of the Apple company over the course of 3 years, so almost half of the company's monetary reserve will end up in the pockets of many investors.
The plans of the management of the Apple company must be approved by the board of directors before being put into practice, so they are not yet ready for execution.
Subject to declaration by the Board of Directors, the Company plans to initiate a quarterly dividend of $2.65 per share sometime in the fourth quarter of its fiscal 2012, which begins on July 1, 2012.
"We have used some of our cash to make great investments in our business through increased research and development, acquisitions, new retail store openings, strategic prepayments and capital expenditures in our supply chain, and building out our infrastructure. You'll see more of all of these in the future," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "Even with these investments, we can maintain a war chest for strategic opportunities and have plenty of cash to run our business. So we are going to initiate a dividend and share repurchase program."
"Combining dividends, share repurchases, and cash used to net-share-settle vesting RSUs, we anticipate utilizing approximately $45 billion of domestic cash in the first three years of our programs," said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple's CFO. "We are extremely confident in our future and see tremendous opportunities ahead."
