Open Market Repurchase Regulations : A Cross-Country Examination

This paper offers a survey of open market share repurchase regulations in the ten largest stock markets around the world: the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Hong Kong. We find that in many nations, open market share repurchases are subject to relatively strict regulations in terms of disclosure and execution. Disclosure in the U.S., however, was not mandatory until recent SEC amendments requiring disclosure in Forms 10-Q and 10-K for periods ending on or after March 2004