Some individual shareholders of Infosys have said they are against the company going in for a buyback and have questioned the founders for airing their views in public.
A few retail shareholders told BusinessLine that in such uncertain times, it was not a wise move to strip the company of cash.
“Many of us invest based on how rich the cash generation is for the company; a cash hoard only lends stability for the company. Returning cash to shareholders in my opinion may be destructive of shareholder value.
“However, this decision is best left to the wisdom of the current board of Infosys and not to the opinion of any particular cross-section of shareholders, be they founders, FIIs or high net worth individuals,” Shekar Viswanathan, Vice-Chairman of Toyota Kirloskar, told
Viswanathan, who is responsible for corporate governance for Toyota Kirloskar, said he was hopeful that the Infosys board has plans for acquisition of other relevant businesses for its growth.
Mohan K, a former employee with Infosys and a senior executive with a multinational chemical company, said the company is sitting on a cash pile and with the slow down persisting, it might not be prudent to go for a buyback.
Prabal Basu Roy, a Sloan Fellow from the London Business School who currently manages a PE fund, said the situation is far worse than what it was in the earlier life-cycle of the company.
“Having said that, there is enough cash in the company. Therefore, they can afford to do it. It will be a face-saver as well,” said Roy, who is not a retail investor in Infosys.
Proxy advisory firm Stakeholder Empowerment Services (SES) said the current situation was not good enough to go in for a buyback. “We should not talk about the decision-making power of the board. How do we know what is the best interest of the company? Everything cannot be shared with the investors. In an uncertain environment, you cannot strip of all the cash in the company,” said JN Gupta, co-founder and MD of SES.