If a company's stock is undervalued - as many managers believe theirs is - a repurchase may offer the best payoff of all.

Approaches to determining stock values vary, but fundamentally, each company judging itself undervalued is saying that its future stream of earnings justifies a higher price than the stock market is willing to accord it.

In the 1987 stock market crash, according to the conclusions of the official Brady report, colossal sales of stock index futures by so-called portfolio insurers - whose investment strategies depended entirely on these derivatives - greatly exacerbated the 500-point market decline.

Wage concessions are difficult to quantify, since their magnitude depends on many operating variables.

Larry Fink, 61, tall and outgoing and passionate about his business, is the chairman, CEO, and co-founder of the largest asset-management company in the world, BlackRock.

A buyback is itself a special kind of acquisition, made at prices that are typically a bargain compared with those a company must pay for an outside purchase.