Dividends have a couple of other negatives. One is that if you reduce the dividend for any reason, people sell the stock. Also I believe if you pay a dividend it reduces the value of the company because it is removed from the company assets, which should reduce the price of stock (if you ignore all other factors influencing the stock price) Finally if the company buys back stock it can then issue it to staff as RSUs over 4 years to make “golden handcuffs” to retain the best players.