Marathon Oil to Buy Back $500M in Shares

Oil producer and refiner Marathon Oil Corp. on Monday said it boosted its stock buyback program by $500 million.

The company said it repurchased about 21 million shares for $1.7 billion under a $2 billion buyback program begun in January last year.

The new $500 million program would allow Marathon to repurchase about 1.6 percent of its shares outstanding, based on the stock's closing price of $88.82 on Friday.

Marathon expects to complete the previous $2 billion buyback in the first quarter this year and finish the $500 million buyback during the rest of the year. The company estimates it had about $2.6 billion in cash on hand at year-end.

Marathon shares fell 18 cents to $88.64 in morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

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