Subject: Mitsubishi monster buy-back
From today's Financial Times;
Buffett-backed Mitsubishi’s shares surge to record high on ‘monster buyback’
David Keohane in Tokyo
Mitsubishi’s shares surged to a record high on Wednesday after the Warren Buffett-backed trading house announced a “monster buyback”.
The Japanese company said on Tuesday that it would buy back up to ¥500bn ($3.4bn) in stock, sending shares up 10 per cent by lunchtime in Tokyo.
Calling it a “monster buyback” that “market participants were not expecting”, Jefferies analyst Thanh Ha Pham added that the company “has another ¥500bn excess cash that it could return to shareholders”.
The surge in the share price will be a boon for Buffett, who has ratcheted up his bet on Japan’s five biggest trading houses, the century-old commodity specialists increasingly operating as global venture capital and private equity businesses.