BASF Has No Plans to Revive Share Buyback Scheme

Unlike U.S. rivals such as Dow Chemical and DuPont, BASF has no plans to revive its share buyback program, the German group's CEO Kurt Bock told Reuters Inside TV.

Interviewed in conjunction with the annual results press conference in Ludwigshafen on Feb. 25, Bock said BASF would prefer to spend the money on new plant and equipment.

"We pay a handsome dividend and then the money is being spent, frankly," the news agency quotes Bock as saying. "We are rightly leveraged, there is little money left for buybacks." From 1999-2008, BASF purchased around €10 billion worth of its own stock.

Bock said also that the group would continue to focus on technology-driven, smaller acquisitions.