TORONTO, Oct. 28, 2013 /CNW/ - Royal Bank of Canada (TSX: RY) (NYSE: RY)
today announced that the Toronto Stock Exchange has approved its normal
course issuer bid to purchase, for cancellation, up to 30 million of
its common shares.
The shares that may be repurchased represent approximately 2.1 per cent of the bank's outstanding common shares. As of October 18, 2013
there were 1,440,955,597 common shares of the bank outstanding.
Purchases under the normal course issuer bid may commence on November 1,
2013 and continue until October 31, 2014, when the bid expires. Purchases may be made through the Toronto Stock Exchange, the New York
Stock Exchange and other designated exchanges and published markets in
both Canada and the U.S. The price paid for any repurchased shares will
be the prevailing market price at the time of acquisition.
The bank will only initiate purchases under the bid after consulting
with the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI).
The amount of purchases on any given day will not exceed 611,400 common
shares, which is 25 per cent of the average daily trading volume on the
Toronto Stock Exchange for the six months ending September 30, 2013.
The average daily trading volume of the bank's shares on the Toronto
Stock Exchange for that six-month period, calculated in accordance with
the rules of the Toronto Stock Exchange for the purposes of the bid,
was 2,445,706 shares.
The purchase of common shares under the normal course issuer bid will
enable the bank to balance the imperatives of maintaining strong
capital ratios with the ongoing need to generate shareholder value.
The bank's previous normal course issuer bid commenced on November 1,
2012 and will expire on October 31, 2013. Over the term of the
previous bid, the bank purchased approximately 6.8 million of its
common shares for cancellation at an average price of $60.33 per share.
Caution regarding forward-looking statements
Certain statements contained in this press release may be deemed to be
forward-looking statements within the meaning of certain securities
laws, including the "safe harbour" provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and any applicable Canadian securities legislation. These
forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements
with respect to the proposed normal course issuer bid by Royal Bank of
Canada. Forward-looking statements are typically identified by words
such as "believe", "expect", "foresee", "forecast", "anticipate",
"intend", "estimate", "goal", "plan" and "project" and similar
expressions of future or conditional verbs such as "will", "may",
"should", "could" or "would".
By their very nature, forward-looking statements require us to make
assumptions and are subject to inherent risks and uncertainties, which
give rise to the possibility that our predictions, forecasts,
projections, expectations or conclusions will not prove to be accurate,
that our assumptions may not be correct and that our forward-looking
statements, including statements about the proposed normal course
issuer bid by Royal Bank of Canada, will not be achieved. We caution
readers not to place undue reliance on these statements as a number of
risk factors could cause our actual results to differ materially from
the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements. These
factors - many of which are beyond our control and the effects of which
can be difficult to predict - include: credit, market, liquidity and
funding, operational, legal and regulatory compliance, insurance,
reputation and strategic risks and other risks discussed in the Risk
management sections of our 2012 Annual Report and in our Q3 2013 Report
to Shareholders; the impact of changes in laws and regulations; general
business and economic market conditions in Canada, the United States
and certain other countries in which we operate, including the effects
of the European sovereign debt crisis, and the high levels of Canadian
household debt; the effects of changes in government fiscal, monetary
and other policies; and judicial or regulatory judgments and legal
proceedings.
We caution that the foregoing list of risk factors is not exhaustive and
other factors could also adversely affect our results. When relying on
our forward-looking statements to make decisions with respect to us,
investors and others should carefully consider the foregoing factors
and other uncertainties and potential events. Material economic
assumptions underlying the forward looking statements contained in this
press release are set out in the Overview and outlook section and for
each business segment under the heading Outlook and priorities in our
2012 Annual Report, as updated by the overview section of our Q3 2013
Report to Shareholders. Additional information about these and other
factors can be found in the Risk management and Overview of other risks
sections of our 2012 Annual Report and in the Risk management section
of our Q3 2013 Report to Shareholders. Except as required by law, we do
not undertake to update any forward-looking statement contained in this
press release.
SOURCE RBC
