Stock price reaction to share repurchase announcements by banks in normal and crisis times

This paper studies stock price reaction to share repurchases announced by U.S. banks between January 2002 and December 2008. Using the standard event study method, we find that the average abnormal return around share repurchase announcements is positive in both normal and crisis times. We also find that the average abnormal return is significantly higher in crisis times. Our results are consistent with the signaling hypothesis for share repurchases.