Shareholders and companies are equally inefficient at allocating capital.
If not for buybacks, the company would probably have wasted the money on creating more useless jobs which would add no value to the company.
Instead, the company prefers to give the money back to shareholders in the form of capital appreciation so that they will either hold it or sell some of it and use the proceeds to buy shares of another equally wasteful corporation.
Eventually these corporate stock buybacks will lead to grotesque wealth inequality and if we're lucky, complete collapse of the international fiat monetary system which facilitates such atrocities.
Instead, the company prefers to give the money back to shareholders in the form of capital appreciation so that they will either hold it or sell some of it and use the proceeds to buy shares of another equally wasteful corporation.
Eventually these corporate stock buybacks will lead to grotesque wealth inequality and if we're lucky, complete collapse of the international fiat monetary system which facilitates such atrocities.