The point about executive compensation is probably the most poignant. If you pay an exec team with fixed price stock options, they can run the company into the

The point about executive compensation is probably the most poignant. If you pay an exec team with fixed price stock options, they can run the company into the ground with debt to issue stock buybacks and do absolutely nothing to improve the business and increase the value of their stock. Stock buybacks do have a place though. When you issue stocks, you're doing so to raise money for the company. You can think of issued stocks as a kind of debt you've issued that continuously pay interest over time, except the interest isn't cash or dividends, it's equity in your company as it grows. If you know your company is in a good place and the stock is undervalued, you could convert that debt so instead of having to pay equity as interest, you pay a dollar amount to a bank. But that tool could also be used to artificially inflate the value of fixed price stock options that may be issued to execs.