Board at Walmart greenlights new share repurchase program

BENTONVILLE, Ark. — Walmart’s board of directors has given the company the green light to repurchase $15 billion of its shares, effective June 6, the company announced at its annual shareholders meeting.

This program replaces the previous $15 billion program announced on June 3, 2011. As of June 6, the company had approximately $712 million remaining on the 2011 Authorization. Under the share repurchase program, repurchased shares are constructively retired and returned to unissued status.

“Our strong cash flow enabled the company to invest in growth and repurchase more than $14 billion of our stock during the last two years,” said EVP and CFO Charles Holley. “We’re pleased to continue our share repurchase program with this new $15 billion authorization.”

In addition to share repurchases, the company continues to return value to shareholders through dividends. Earlier this year, Walmart increased the fiscal 2013 dividend per share by approximately 18% to $1.88 for fiscal 2014, up from $1.59 in fiscal 2013.

“We’re proud of our long history of returning value to shareholders through the combination of dividends and share repurchases. Together, we returned $6.2 billion to shareholders year-to-date during fiscal 2014, including the recent payment of our second quarter dividend,” Holley added. “And during the last 10 years, Walmart returned nearly $100 billion to shareholders. We also increased our dividend every year since March of 1974, when we began paying a dividend of 5 cents per share.”