I don’t think that this is surprising at all. Stock buybacks are undertaken as the return the company can get on the cash returned is lower than they think sha

I don’t think that this is surprising at all. Stock buybacks are undertaken as the return the company can get on the cash returned is lower than they think shareholders want. Subsidies exist to get the company to invest in a project where the return would otherwise be inadequate for shareholders. I suppose you could force a company to invest in a project that was perceived to have inadequate returns but that seems a little unfair?