S&P 500 companies scrap buybacks after two-year bonanza

Suspensions of stock-buyback programs at AT&T Inc., Chevron Corp., Intel Corp. and elsewhere follow a two-year buying binge. Companies in the S&P 500 Index repurchased $728.7 billion of shares in 2019, according to data released by S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC. The spending followed $806.4 billion of outlays in 2018, when many companies used savings from U.S. tax-law changes for share repurchases. "Buybacks may be slow to come back" as companies set other spending priorities in any recovery, Howard Silverblatt, a senior index analyst at S&P Dow Jones, wrote in an email.