Rakuten shares pop 12% on share buyback announcement

Shares in Japan’s Rakuten shot up on Wednesday morning after the online retailer said it would buy back up to 120m of its shares for as much as ¥100bn ($880m).

The company announced the buyback on Tuesday, which commenced today and will run until February 21, 2018.

Shares had fallen 8.9 per cent by Monday’s close in the week since Rakuten revealed operating profit had fallen for the first time in more than two years during the quarter ended December.

The company’s stock jumped as much as 12.2 per cent on Wednesday morning in Tokyo before pulling back to a rise of 8.6 per cent. At ¥1,120, shares are still down 0.8 per cent from their last close prior to the release of Q4 results.