Can you point me in the direction of the source for your claims that IAG have carried out a minimum €500m per year share buyback every year for the past decade please? I recall only two periods of share buybacks one was for €500m and the other slightly more, perhaps €600m?
I agree that in normal times, companies should stand on their own two feet, however these are not normal times. The governments of the world are injecting so much cash into paying people’s salaries because without doing so, huge numbers of perfectly viable companies would simply collapse. The money is not being spent to prop up failing businesses, or to feed greedy shareholders. It is being spent to fight Cov19 and save millions and millions of lives. Calling a halt to economic activity is incredibly damaging and suggesting businesses should be left to deal with it unaided is staggeringly short-sighted. The world is already going to be a very different place when we come out the other side of this, but I shudder to think what it would be like if businesses and individuals were just left to deal with this by themselves.