Buyback Scorecard Soaring Buybacks, Sagging ReturnsBest & Worst CompaniesIndustry Comparisons

The table below ranks the 299 companies in the S&P 500 that bought back at least 4 percent of their shares from September 30, 2013, through September 30, 2015. The companies are ranked according to their return on investment from these repurchases. 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 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.

How the S&P 500 Stack Up as Stock Repurchasers 1—50 | 51—100 | 101—150 | 151—200 | 201—250 | 251—299
	Company	Industry	Market Capitalization	$ Total Buyback	$ Total Buyback / Market Cap	Buyback Strategy	Buyback Effectiveness	Buyback ROI
	Average		$48,969	$3,699	9.2%	20.8%	-3.9%	16.3%
	Median		$24,408	$1,949	7.7%	20.1%	-3.6%	16.5%
1	Darden Restaurants	Consumer Services	8,751	502	5.7	25.9	23.7	55.8
2	Tesoro Corp.	Energy	11,970	693	5.8	42.3	8.1	53.8
3	Cigna Corp.	Healthcare Equipment and Services	34,767	2,315	6.7	36.4	9.5	49.4
4	O'Reilly Automotive	Retailing	24,851	1,962	7.9	40.5	6.1	49.2
5	The Kroger Co.	Food and Staples Retailing	35,112	2,167	6.2	40.8	4.4	47.0
6	HCA Holdings	Healthcare Equipment and Services	32,119	3,636	11.3	50.5	-3.3	45.6
7	Expedia	Retailing	16,703	754	4.5	48.1	-2.4	44.6
8	Sealed Air Corp.	Materials	9,650	881	9.1	36.9	5.5	44.4
9	Humana	Healthcare Equipment and Services	26,530	1,475	5.6	43.2	0.9	44.4
10	Starbucks Corp.	Consumer Services	84,362	2,195	2.6	26.6	12.8	42.8
11	Hasbro	Consumer Durables and Apparel	9,010	551	6.1	32.5	7.1	41.9
12	Aetna	Healthcare Equipment and Services	38,150	1,992	5.2	35.7	4.1	41.2
13	Walgreens Boots Alliance	Food and Staples Retailing	90,769	1,694	1.9	36.7	2.3	39.9
14	Eli Lilly & Co.	Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology and Life Sciences	88,764	1,797	2.0	31.1	5.8	38.8
15	UnitedHealth Group	Healthcare Equipment and Services	110,623	5,960	5.4	31.4	5.2	38.2
16	Altera Corp.	Semiconductors and Semiconductor Equipment	15,148	904	6.0	20.0	14.8	37.7
17	NIKE	Consumer Durables and Apparel	105,187	5,224	5.0	33.2	2.4	36.4
18	Anthem	Healthcare Equipment and Services	36,622	4,515	12.3	34.6	0.5	35.3
19	Red Hat	Software and Services	13,189	645	4.9	21.8	9.6	33.5
20	Activision Blizzard	Software and Services	22,519	5,830	25.9	31.1	1.7	33.3
21	Celgene Corp.	Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology and Life Sciences	85,513	6,256	7.3	33.1	-0.1	32.9
22	Fiserv	Software and Services	20,317	2,080	10.2	33.7	-0.7	32.8
23	Dr Pepper Snapple Group	Food, Beverage and Tobacco	15,090	941	6.2	34.2	-1.3	32.5
24	AmerisourceBergen Corp.	Healthcare Equipment and Services	20,537	2,613	12.7	35.7	-2.5	32.2
25	Equifax	Commercial and Professional Services	11,491	498	4.3	28.8	2.6	32.0
26	Leggett & Platt	Consumer Durables and Apparel	5,644	363	6.4	27.5	3.3	31.7
27	The Home Depot	Retailing	148,301	14,143	9.5	25.0	5.1	31.4
28	Valero Energy Corp.	Energy	29,876	3,477	11.6	37.2	-4.4	31.1
29	The Chubb Corp.	Insurance	27,847	2,497	9.0	21.5	7.8	31.0
30	CVS Health Corp.	Food and Staples Retailing	107,865	8,649	8.0	34.8	-3.0	30.8
31	Masco Corp.	Capital Goods	8,661	365	4.2	21.8	6.9	30.2
32	Northrop Grumman Corp.	Capital Goods	31,098	6,242	20.1	37.5	-5.4	30.2
33	Nasdaq	Diversified Financials	9,009	488	5.4	28.5	-0.1	28.4
34	Ross Stores	Retailing	19,779	1,316	6.7	23.6	3.8	28.2
35	The Walt Disney Co.	Media	172,499	12,622	7.3	32.3	-3.2	28.1
36	Cintas Corp.	Commercial and Professional Services	9,434	1,037	11.0	35.6	-5.6	28.0
37	AutoZone	Retailing	22,192	2,371	10.7	28.7	-0.6	27.9
38	Mondelez International	Food, Beverage and Tobacco	67,465	4,703	7.0	19.8	6.5	27.6
39	Apple	Technology Hardware and Equipment	629,010	80,253	12.8	35.7	-6.8	26.5
40	The Hartford Financial Services Group	Insurance	18,992	2,470	13.0	23.8	2.0	26.2
41	Newell Rubbermaid	Consumer Durables and Apparel	10,634	925	8.7	28.1	-1.6	26.1
42	Lowe's Cos.	Retailing	63,767	8,200	12.96	25.0	0.4	25.5
43	Tractor Supply Co.	Retailing	11,452	589	5.1	21.3	3.3	25.2
44	eBay	Software and Services	29,773	4,768	16.0	14.9	9.0	25.2
45	Southwest Airlines Co.	Transportation	25,082	2,174	8.7	65.9	-25.0	24.5
46	CR Bard	Healthcare Equipment and Services	13,824	1,237	8.9	29.2	-3.7	24.4
47	Visa	Software and Services	169,476	7,116	4.2	25.2	-0.8	24.3
48	General Dynamics Corp.	Capital Goods	44,520	6,111	13.7	33.4	-6.9	24.2
49	Avery Dennison Corp.	Materials	5,173	430	8.3	19.8	2.6	22.9
50	Lockheed Martin Corp.	Capital Goods	64,377	4,493	7.0	33.8	-8.2	22.7
Source: Fortuna Advisors Analysis using data from the Capital IQ database. Financial Data from September 2013 to September 2015. Includes the 486 members of the current S&P 500 that were public for the full period. Market Capitalization as of: 09/30/2015. Companies included here if $ Total Buyback / Market Capitalization is greater than 4% or if $ Total Buyback is greater than $1 billion.