Stiritz believed buyback returns represented a handy benchmark for other internal capital investment decisions, particularly acquisitions. As his longtime lieutenant, Pat Mulcahy, said, “The hurdle we always used for investment decisions was the share repurchase return. If an acquisition, with some certainty, could beat that return, it was worth doing.”3 Conversely, if a potential acquisition’s returns didn’t meaningfully exceed the buyback return, Stiritz passed.
