TOKYO: Toyota is to buy back as much as 1.89 percent of its shares for 360bn yen ($3.5bn), raiding a growing corporate cash chest for the first time in five years, the Japanese carmaker said yesterday.
The world’s largest automaker said it will purchase up to 60 million shares over a 10-month period following the next shareholders’ meeting in June. It will cancel half of them, to avoid sparking fears of dilution in future share sales, the company said in a statement.
The other shares will be handed over to a trust that will manage them on behalf of a new foundation to “support efforts to address mobility challenges around the world” such as traffic jams and better use of energy, it said. AFP
