US Big Corp Pretax Income increases went through the roof in 2010, and are doing just fine in 2011.
But the driver of this incredible US Big Corp Pretax Income growth in both 2010 and 2011 is mainly the Pretax profits generated overseas. This overseas income shift, along with the shipping overseas of the related US jobs, accelerated dramatically at the start of the 2000 Decade, and continues unabated, due both to lower overseas labor costs and to lower income tax rates in foreign tax havens.
And the much more modest US Pretax Profit increases in the most recent two years is driven more by US cost reductions, mostly much lower labor and related employee costs, rather than by highly desirable true increased economic profits from improved US demand.
Thus these massive increases in Pretax Income of US Big Corps haven't translated into highly-charged real US GDP growth.
This real US GDP growth has also been hampered by the severe US housing crisis, and the linked widespread underwater mortgage situation, which continue unabated.
In addition, this real US GDP growth has been negatively impacted by the very high energy cost environment.
Given this troubled US economic environment, despite the sky high Pretax Profits of the Big US Corps, it is only logical that US unemployment and US underemployment continue to be at a very high level. And it is also only logical that the US median income of those employed full time is unacceptably too low.
This horrible US job situation is a perfect storm for Big US Corps, the key members of the 1%. They get the benefit of having extremely hard-working, very loyal employees, who are afraid of losing their jobs. Thus the annual pay raises are modest. And these Big US Corps can freely replace workers by trading down for lower pay and related employee benefit costs of new workers. Further, many of these Big US Corps have taken full advantage of the much cheaper temporary work market.
Suffice it to say that the deck has been stacked against the US worker. And the Republicans in the US Congress, and sadly even a handful of the Democrats, continue to protect this very unfavorable environment for workers, which clearly benefits the US Big Corps, the 1%.
But to pile on, by using widespread financial engineering, the increases in the after-tax Net Income of the US Big Corps is even much more pronounced than the increases in the Pretax Income of these US Big Corps.
Let me focus on the 30 Dow Industrial Companies to show how substantial the spread is between the increased Pretax Profits and the increased after-tax Profits of these huge Dow companies.
Of the 30 Dow companies, 21 of them have had Net Income From Continuing Operations percentage increases that have exceeded their related Pretax Income From Continuing Operations percentage increases in the 8 years from 2002 to 2010. And 17 of them had this spread to be above 8%. Below here are these 17 Dow companies.
Pretax Income (PTI) vs Net Income (NI) % Growth (2002 to 2010)
...................................................................NI % Growth
........................% Change......% Change........Higher Than
..........................in PTI............in NI............PTI % Growth
ATT.....................78%.............164%..................86%
MCD...................321%.............399%..................77%
JPM...................887%.............944%..................58%
MSFT.................154%.............207%..................53%
HD.....................(10)%...............31%..................41%
KO......................159%.............198%..................39%
PG......................102%.............127%..................26%
CSCO....................56%...............81%..................25%
BAC(1)...............(15)%...............10%..................25%
JNJ......................82%.............102%..................20%
IBM....................162%.............178%..................16%
3M.......................92%.............104%..................13%
GE.....................(25)%.............(13)%..................12%
PFE...................(20)%...............(9)%..................10%
CAT...................237%.............247%..................10%
CVX(2)................27%...............36%....................9%
WMT...................90%...............99%....................9%
(1) Bank of America (BAC) 2010 PTI excludes huge Goodwill Impairment Charge.
(2) Chevron (CVX) earlier year is 2005, rather than 2002.
This substantially more robust Net Income growth over Pretax Income growth is mainly due to the shifting of US income overseas to foreign tax havens.
And the increased number and amounts of tax subsidies granted to US Big Corps, such as those favoring Big Oil and Big Financial Corps, have also helped this very favorable income increase spread.
In addition, these US Big Corps have benefited immensely from taking widespread advantage of very favorable tax settlements with the IRS in their Tax Audits. You can see this from the massive amounts of tax benefits booked by many of these large US Corps, as is shown in their income tax footnotes in their annual and quarterly reports filed with the SEC.
While the IRS has consistently caved in to the 1% US Big Corps in their tax audits, it doesn't take similar actions in its tax audits of small businesses. So it's not just many in the US Congress, but also many suits working for the dysfunctional IRS, who take actions that clearly and consistently favor the 1% over the 99%. Frankly, I think the Occupy Movement should add the IRS to its protest targets against the 1%.
With the bottom line after-tax Net Income percentage increases of these huge US corporations being substantially higher than their Pretax Income percentage increases, the stock prices of these Big Corps are substantially advanced, since bottom line after-tax Net Income is much more relevant to the stock market than is Pretax Income.
But you know what? US citizens, the 99%, get absolutely no economic benefit from this creative financial engineering causing this very favorable income spread accruing to the benefit of US Big Corps.
In fact, the 99% suffer from this financial engineering.
Why? Because the main cause of this income spread is the shifting of income from the US to lower foreign income tax havens, with the resultant substantial US job loss.
But now let me turn my attention to the main topic of this post, the massive stock buyback programs of US Big Corps.
While nearly all of them spend heavily on Common Stock Buybacks, there are 10 of these 30 Dow Industrial companies, as you can see below, which had their Total Amount Spent on Common Stock Buybacks exceed 50% of their Total Cash Flow Generated From Operations in the most recent 6 years (from 2005 to 2010).
.......................Six Years 2005 to 2010
..................Common Stock........Cash Flow
.....................Buybacks.......From Operations.....%
...........................( millions of dollars)
CSCO..............44,790..................60,241..........74%
MSFT..............91,492................123,916..........74%
DIS................26,074..................35,695..........73%
HPQ...............52,863..................73,499..........72%
HD.................23,430..................35,246..........66%
IBM...............68,033.................105,161..........65%
PG.................51,868...................84,846..........61%
TRV...............14,447..................24,072..........60%
MCD..............17,519...................31,565..........56%
XOM............148,131.................286,002..........52%
So how is the 99% impacted by these massive stock buybacks of US Big Corps, the 1%?
Well, they are crushed.
Why? Because these greedy US Big Corps are spending a very significant portion of their Cash Flow Generated From Operations on these Common Stock Buybacks. This doesn't help the 99% at all. In fact, it hurts them.
How? Well, the Big Corps elect to greedily spend on buying back their own common stock, which does absolutely nothing for US job creation, rather than electing to make wise, patriotic investment spending on hiring workers, on training workers, on capital expenditures, and on research and development, all of which increase real US GDP growth and US job creation.
So, what's with all of these massive common stock buybacks, which were approved by the Board of Directors, mostly 1%ers, of these US Big Corps?
It's all about the substantially favorable impact of stock buyback programs on Earnings Per Share (EPS), which is the true driver of the market prices of common stocks. And much of the compensation of top executives of US Big Corps, who are mostly 1%, is driven by the market prices of the US Big Corps that they work for.
When a company buys back its own stock, the number of common shares outstanding, the denominator in the EPS computation, is reduced. Thus, this bumps up EPS.
To quantify the extent on the EPS denominator, there were 21 of the 30 Dow Industrial Corps which had their Diluted Weighted Average Number of Common Shares Outstanding decrease by more than 5% in the past 8 years, from 2002 to 2010, as you can see below.
........Weighted Average Number of Common Shares Outstanding
.....................2010...............2002........% Decrease
..................(millions of shares)
TRV...............483.................713(1)..........-32%
HPQ............2,128...............3,063.............-31%
HD..............1,658...............2,344.............-29%
XOM...........4,897...............6,803.............-28%
IBM............1,287...............1,731.............-26%
CSCO..........5,563...............7,223.............-23%
MSFT.........8,593..............10,882.............-21%
WMT..........3,670...............4,446.............-17%
MCD...........1,080...............1,282.............-16%
INTC..........5,696...............6,759.............-16%
AXP...........1,195................1,330.............-10%
UTX.............923................1,011...............-9%
JNJ...........2,789...............3,054...............-9%
PG............3,002...............3,286...............-9%
3M...............726..................791...............-8%
BA...............744..................808...............-8%
DD...............922..................999...............-8%
DIS...........1,909...............2,067...............-8%
CAT.............650..................694...............-6%
KO............2,333...............2,483...............-6%
CVX.........2,007...............2,126...............-6%
(1) Travelers (TRV) earlier year is 2005, rather than 2002.
Granted, when a company buys back its own stock, the Net Income of the Controlling Interest of the Corporation, which is predominantly the entire numerator in this EPS computation, is also reduced. This reduces EPS.
But with the financial meltdown, the US Government created an economic environment where interest rates are so incredibly low. In addition, the larger US Corps benefit from having lower interest rates on their debt due to their financial strength. Thus the negative impact on the EPS numerator of US Big Corp from common stock buybacks is minor as compared with the substantially positive impact on the EPS denominator.
But the 99%, including small businesses, don't benefit from these common stock buybacks of US Big Corps. Only the 1% do. Again the deck is stacked against the 99%.
Just how much impact is there on EPS from all of these common stock buybacks of US Big Corps? Well, it's just massive.
There were 21 of the 30 Dow companies which had their EPS From Continuing Operations percentage increase exceed by at least 12% their percentage increase of Net Income From Continuing Operations of the Controlling Interest(NI of CI), of the Big Corp, for the past 8 years, from 2002 to 2010, as you can see below.
........EPS % Change vs NI of CI % Change (2002 to 2010)
..........................................................EPS % Change
...........................................................Higher Than
......................NI of CI.............EPS..........NI of CI
.....................% Change.......% Change....% Change
HPQ.................179%.............300%...........121%
XOM................177%.............286%...........110%
IBM.................178%.............275%............97%
CVX................1626%...........1723%............97%
MCD.................399%.............495%............96%
MSFT...............207%.............290%............82%
INTC................268%.............337%............69%
TRV(1)..............56%..............124%............68%
CSCO.................81%..............134%............53%
DIS.................259%..............306%............47%
WMT.................96%..............138%............41%
HD.....................-9%...............29%............38%
CAT.................238%.............261%............23%
KO..................197%..............216%............19%
JNJ.................102%..............121%............19%
UTX..................96%..............114%............19%
3M..................107%.............125%............18%
AXP..................52%...............67%............15%
DD....................65%...............78%............14%
PG(1)................36%...............49%............13%
BA....................44%...............57%............12%
(1) Both Travelers (TRV) and Procter & Gamble (PG) have 2005 as their earlier year above, rather than 2002.
Given the devastatingly negative effect of these massive US Big Corp Common Stock Buybacks on the 99%, including small businesses, and the incredibly outsized positive effect on the 1% US Big Corps, I think it would be wise for the US Government to provide a measured disincentive for US Big Corps that overdose on common stock buybacks.
Perhaps, something like the following would make sense. For any US Corporation whose dollar amounts of its Common Stock Buybacks in any year exceed perhaps 40% of its Cash Flow Generated From Operations, a financial fee would be paid to the US Government for a certain percentage of these excess Common Stock Buybacks which exceed this 40%.
When I get some time, I'll expand this research to include some non-Dow US Big Corps. I expect that the results for these non-Dow US Big Corps will be very similar to what was found here for the above Dow Industrial companies.
Here is my subsequent research related to the extent of Common Stock Buybacks by the Big 4 Health Insurance Corps for just the most recent 6 years from 2005 to 2010:
.............................Six Years 2005 to 2010
........................Common Stock........Cash Flow
...........................Buybacks.......From Operations.....%
.................................(millions of dollars)
WellPoint.............21,308..................18,516.........115%
Cigna......................6,147...................6,846..........90%
Aetna.....................9,836..................11,464..........86%
United Health.......18,503.................32,622..........57%
.......Weighted Average Number of Common Shares Outstanding
..............................2010...............2005........% Decrease
...........................(millions of shares)
WellPoint................416..................626..............-34%
Aetna.....................423..................606..............-30%
Cigna......................275..................389..............-29%
United Health.......1,131...............1,333...............-15%
...........EPS % Change vs NI of CI % Change (2005 to 2010)
...............................................................EPS % Change
................................................................Higher Than
.........................NI of CI*..............EPS..........NI of CI
........................% Change.........% Change....% Change
WellPoint.............17%.................76%..............59%
Aetna...................12%.................61%..............49%
Cigna.....................5%.................49%..............44%
United Health......50%................77%...............27%
* Net Income of Controlled Interest, or of the Corp
And here is my subsequent research related to the extent of Common Stock Buybacks by the Big 4 US Defense Contractor Corps for just the most recent 6 years from 2005 to 2010:
...................................Six Years 2005 to 2010
..............................Common Stock........Cash Flow
.................................Buybacks.......From Operations.....%
....................................(millions of dollars)
Raytheon....................6,780..................11,596..........58%
Lockheed Martin.......12,754..................22,359..........57%
Northrop Grumman....7,042..................14,851..........47%
General Dynamics.......3,854..................16,106..........24%
.......Weighted Average Number of Common Shares Outstanding
.................................2010...............2005........% Decrease
..............................(millions of shares)
Lockheed Martin........368.................446...............-17%
Northrop Grumman...301.................363...............-17%
Raytheon...................377.................453...............-17%
General Dynamics......385.................405.................-5%
................EPS % Change vs NI of CI % Change (2005 to 2010)
....................................................................EPS % Change
.....................................................................Higher Than
..............................NI of CI*..............EPS..........NI of CI
.............................% Change.........% Change....% Change
Raytheon.................101%................142%............41%
Northrop Grumman...46%.................76%............30%
Lockheed Martin.......45%..................75%............30%
General Dynamics......81%..................91%............10%
* Net Income of Controlled Interest, or of the Corp
And here is my subsequent research related to the extent that non-Dow, non-Health Insurance Big US Health Care Corps have overdosed on Common Stock Buybacks for just the most recent 6 years from 2005 to 2010:
.......................................Six Years 2005 to 2010
..................................Common Stock........Cash Flow
.....................................Buybacks.......From Operations.....%
...........................................(millions of dollars)
Biogen IDEC.....................7,202..................7,014.........103%
Medco Health Solutions..11,067.................11,130..........99%
Cardinal Health................6,844...................8,745..........78%
Gilead Sciences................8,024..................11,746..........68%
Amgen..........................20,792..................33,812..........61%
McKesson........................6,534...................11,151..........59%
Forest Labs......................2,955...................5,878..........50%
Baxter.............................7,247..................14,465..........50%
Becton Dickinson.............4,149...................9,058..........46%
Medtronic.......................9,101..................20,438..........45%
Walgreens.......................6,090..................19,334..........31%
.......Weighted Average Number of Common Shares Outstanding
.....................................2010...............2005........% Decrease
..................................(millions of shares)
Biogen IDEC...................255..................346...............-26%
Amgen...........................965...............1,258...............-23%
Medco Health Solutions.452..................587...............-23%
Cardinal Health..............353..................429...............-18%
McKesson......................263..................316...............-17%
Forest Labs....................291..................340...............-14%
Becton Dickinson...........226..................257...............-12%
Medtronic...................1,082...............1,217...............-11%
Walgreens......................925...............1,019.................-9%
Gilead Sciences..............873..................949.................-8%
Baxter...........................594..................629.................-6%
Stryker..........................400.................411..................-3%
................EPS % Change vs NI of CI % Change (2005 to 2010)
...........................................................................EPS % Change
............................................................................Higher Than
.....................................NI of CI*..............EPS..........NI of CI
....................................% Change.........% Change....% Change
Biogen IDEC.....................524%...............738%...........214%
Medco Health Solutions..137%................207%............70%
Amgen..............................26%..................63%............37%
McKesson.........................52%..................82%............30%
Gilead Sciences...............256%................286%............30%
Forest Labs......................48%..................73%............25%
Becton Dickinson.............55%..................76%............21%
Cardinal Health...............-17%....................1%............18%
Walgreens........................55%..................71%............16%
Medtronic........................22%..................37%............15%
Baxter.............................48%..................57%..............9%
Stryker..........................101%................107%..............6%
The Health Care Industry is rampant with large Corps that are able to continually reduce their effective income tax rates. Below here are the non-Dow, non-Health Insurance Big US Health Care Corps that had their Net Income From Continuing Operations percentage increases that have exceeded their related Pretax Income From Continuing Operations percentage increases in the 5 years from 2005 to 2010.
Pretax Income (PTI) vs Net Income (NI) % Growth (2005 to 2010)
........................................................................NI % Growth
.............................% Change......% Change........Higher Than
...............................in PTI............in NI............PTI % Growth
Biogen IDEC..............380%............458%.................78%
Gilead Sciences.........237%.............255%.................18%
Baxter........................31%...............49%..................18%
Stryker.......................85%.............101%..................17%
Amgen..........................9%..............26%..................17%
Covidien.....................17%..............32%..................15%
Abbott Labs................24%..............37%..................13%
Eli Lilly.....................140%.............153%..................13%
McKesson...................40%..............52%..................12%
Medtronic...................18%..............22%....................4%
Becton Dickinson........52%..............55%....................3%
HCA............................-4%...............-2%....................2%
And here is my subsequent research related to the extent that non-Dow Big US Financial Corps have overdosed on Common Stock Buybacks for just the most recent 6 years from 2005 to 2010:
.......................................Six Years 2005 to 2010
..................................Common Stock........Cash Flow
.....................................Buybacks.......From Operations.....%
...........................................(millions of dollars)
Charles Schwab.................4,657..................5,713..........82%
Aon..................................4,278..................5,305..........81%
Franklin Resources...........5,825..................8,275..........70%
Western Union..................3,043..................6,682..........46%
Chubb..............................7,947.................17,620.........45%
Visa*................................3,024..................7,675..........39%
T Rowe Price.....................1,484..................3,902..........38%
Progressive......................3,865.................10,525..........37%
Allstate............................9,337.................27,993..........33%
.......Weighted Average Number of Common Shares Outstanding
....................................2010...............2005........% Decrease
.....................................(millions of shares)
Chubb...........................322.................408...............-21%
Allstate.........................543.................667...............-19%
Progressive..................663..................799...............-17%
Franklin Resources.......222.................262...............-15%
Aon..............................298..................342...............-13%
Western Union.............669..................764...............-12%
Charles Schwab..........1,194..............1,308.................-9%
Visa*...........................707.................769.................-8%
Aflac...........................473..................508.................-7%
MasterCard..................131..................135.................-3%
T Rowe Price...............265..................273.................-3%
................EPS % Change vs NI of CI % Change (2005 to 2010)
...........................................................................EPS % Change
............................................................................Higher Than
.....................................NI of CI*..............EPS..........NI of CI
....................................% Change.........% Change....% Change
Visa*..............................392%................438%............46%
Chubb...............................19%..................51%............32%
Franklin Resources...........52%..................77%............25%
Aon..................................76%..................98%............22%
MasterCard......................591%................610%...........19%
Progressive......................-23%..................-7%............16%
Western Union...................-2%..................12%............14%
Allstate............................-47%.................-35%............12%
Aflac.................................58%..................70%............12%
Charles Schwab................-28%.................-21%..............7%
T Rowe Price.....................56%..................60%..............4%
* Visa's above earlier year is 2007, rather than 2005.
And here is my subsequent research related to the extent that extremely profitable Non-Dow US Big Corps, with Annual Pretax Income just short of $2 bil and above, and which are in Other Sectors which were not already covered above in this post, have overdosed on Common Stock Buybacks for just the most recent 6 years from 2005 to 2010:
...................................Six Years 2005 to 2010
..............................Common Stock.......Cash Flow
.................................Buybacks.......From Operations.....%
....................................(millions of dollars)
Texas Instruments......19,869................20,261............98%
Dell.............................17,946................22,438............80%
Gap...............................7,961..................9,966............80%
Time Warner...............25,538................32,942............78%
Applied Materials.........7,831................10,378............75%
Viacom........................8,176................11,024.............74%
Accenture..................12,754................17,796............72%
DirecTV......................14,983................21,526............70%
ADP.............................6,784..................9,834............69%
Phillip Morris*............15,911................25,256............63%
General Mills................6,790................10,861............63%
Best Buy.......................6,025................10,800............56%
TJX..............................4,990..................9,117.............55%
Deere...........................5,776................11,165..............52%
Nike..............................6,243................12,195.............51%
Colgate Palmolive.........7,106................14,600............49%
PepsiCo......................20,010................41,113.............49%
CSX...............................5,661................13,531.............42%
UPS.............................12,526................30,051............42%
Kimberly Clark..............6,558................16,062............41%
Illinois Tool Works........4,988................12,332............40%
Honeywell.....................8,474................21,504............39%
Costco...........................5,560................14,153............39%
Ebay..............................6,041................15,435............39%
Target..........................10,265................29,020...........35%
Praxair..........................3,742................11,296............33%
EMC...............................6,112................18,931............32%
Lowe's...........................7,916................24,719............32%
Oracle..........................14,151................45,613............31%
Qualcomm....................8,095................26,770...........30%
Norfolk Southern...........4,151................13,933............30%
* Phillip Morris above numbers are for the 3 years from 2008 to 2010.
.......Weighted Average Number of Common Shares Outstanding
....................................2010..........2005.....% Decrease
.....................................(millions of shares)
DirecTV.........................886..........1,395..........-36%
GPS................................641............902..........-29%
Texas Instruments......1,213..........1,671..........-27%
Time Warner...............1,145..........1,570..........-27%
Loews............................420............558..........-25%
Dell.............................1,955..........2,449..........-20%
Newscorp...................2,633..........3,228..........-18%
Target...........................729.............889..........-18%
TJX...............................406.............492..........-17%
Best Buy........................417.............505..........-17%
Accenture.....................742.............895..........-17%
Viacom.........................594.............716..........-17%
CSX...............................385.............456..........-16%
Applied Materials.......1,330..........1,565..........-15%
Comcast.....................2,820..........3,312..........-15%
ADP..............................498.............580..........-14%
Kimberly Clark..............414............477..........-13%
Deere............................429............493..........-13%
Lowes........................1,403..........1,607..........-13%
Phillip Morris*...........1,842..........2,109..........-13%
Illinois Tool Works.......503.............575..........-13%
General Mills................665.............758..........-12%
Halliburton...................911..........1,038..........-12%
EMC...........................2,148..........2,433..........-12%
Kroger..........................638.............731..........-13%
UPS...........................1,003...........1,116..........-10%
Norfolk Southern..........372.............412..........-10%
Emerson Electric..........754.............825............-9%
Honeywell....................781.............852............-8%
Colgate Palmolive.........511.............557............-8%
Nike.............................486.............528............-8%
Costco..........................443.............480............-8%
Devon Energy..............436.............470............-7%
Praxair.........................311.............330............-6%
Union Pacific................503............533............-6%
Carnival.......................805.............853............-6%
PepsiCo......................1,614..........1,706............-5%
Ebay..........................1,327..........1,394............-5%
Southern Copper..........850.............883............-4%
Oracle........................5,128..........5,287............-3%
Monsanto.....................542.............552............-2%
Altria Group*............2,079..........2,113............-2%
* Phillip Morris and Altria Group both have an earlier year above of 2007, rather than 2005.
................EPS % Change vs NI of CI % Change (2005 to 2010)
........................................................................EPS % Change
.........................................................................Higher Than
..................................NI of CI*..............EPS..........NI of CI
.................................% Change.........% Change....% Change
DirecTV........................621%...............945%..........325%
Comcast........................339%...............416%...........77%
Texas Instruments..........49%...............102%...........53%
Loews.............................36%.................86%...........50%
Gap..................................6%.................49%...........43%
TJX................................94%...............134%...........40%
Time Warner....................3%.................42%...........39%
CSX..............................117%...............150%...........38%
Accenture.....................77%...............114%............36%
Viacom..........................37%.................65%...........28%
Target............................21%.................48%...........26%
ADP...............................49%.................74%...........25%
Best Buy.........................12%.................36%...........24%
Applied Materials..........27%.................49%...........23%
General Mills.................65%.................86%...........21%
Deere............................32%.................52%...........20%
EMC..............................68%.................87%...........20%
Dell..............................-27%.................-8%............19%
Kimberly Clark..............17%.................34%...........18%
Newscorp........................6%.................24%...........17%
Union Pacific...............171%...............188%...........17%
Phillip Morris*..............20%.................37%...........17%
Kroger...........................16%.................33%...........16%
Illinois Tool Works..........3%.................18%...........15%
Colgate Palmolive..........63%................77%...........14%
Nike...............................53%................66%...........13%
Halliburton...................-15%.................-3%...........12%
Emerson Electric...........33%.................45%...........12%
Norfolk Southern...........17%.................29%...........12%
Honeywell.....................29%.................41%...........11%
Costco...........................33%.................43%...........11%
UPS..............................-10%...................0%...........10%
Praxair..........................63%.................73%...........10%
Lowe's..........................-27%................-18%.............9%
PepsiCo.........................55%.................64%.............9%
Oracle..........................153%...............161%.............8%
Ebay.............................66%.................74%.............8%
Devon Energy..............-20%...............-15%.............6%
Southern Copper...........11%.................15%.............4%
Carnival.......................-12%.................-9%.............4%
Monsanto....................139%..............143%.............3%
Qualcomm.....................85%...............88%.............2%
Altria Group*................25%...............26%.............2%
* Phillip Morris and Altria Group both have an earlier year above of 2007, rather than 2005.
When I review all of the above numbers, it is pretty clear to me that the Occupying Protesters are spot on.....the deck is clearly stacked in favor of the US Big Corps and their beneficiaries, nearly all 1%ers, who are amassing this incredibly lucrative wealth from the very simple financial engineering strategy of overdosing on Common Stock Buybacks.
The 99%, including all small US businesses and the overwhelming majority of all US businesses, either can't do this or fair-mindedly elect to not do this. And even worse, this US Big Corp Common Stock Buyback Overdosing negatively impacts the economic situation of all of the 99%, thereby markedly expanding the Wealth GAP between the 1% and the 99%.
It's not right.....not even close to being right. And the US Congress has consistently allowed, and even fostered, this devastatingly detrimental, greedy overdosing by US Big Corps on Common Stock Buybacks to happen.
The country's 99% is shouting out for the US Congress to completely reverse course and to start serving the entire country, instead of just the 1%. Many in the US Congress publicly claim that they are serving the entire country, but by their actions, they are consistently and clearly legislating for just the 1%. The only part of the US Government that is consistently attempting to serve the entire country is the Obama Administration, although even they do go off target on the US economy at times.
==================
Dow Industrials
3M 3M
AA Alcoa
ATT ATT
AXP American Express
BA Boeing
BAC Bank of America
CAT Caterpillar
CSCO Cisco
CVX Chevron
DD Dupont
DIS Walt Disney
GE GE
HD Home Depot
HPQ Hewlett Packard
IBM IBM
INTC Intel
JNJ JNJ
JPM JPMorgan Chase
KFT Kraft Foods
KO Coca Cola
MCD McDonalds
MRK Merck
MSFT Microsoft
PFE Pfizer
PG Procter & Gamble
TRV Travelers
UTX United Technologies
VZ Verizon
WMT Walmart
XOM Exxon Mobil
