NEW YORK (AP) — Recently freed from regulators’ coronavirus restrictions, the largest U.S. banks have announced plans to return tens of billions of dollars to their shareholders over the next year in the form of dividends and stock buybacks. It’s a signal that banks are looking to reward their shareholders after last year’s pandemic-driven losses. But it’s also a sign banks at the moment see few places to put their big profits other than back into the hands of their shareholders. In an attempt to ensure banks could hold up in the face of a severe pandemic-induced recession, the Federal Reserve last year put into place restrictions on how much banks could pay in dividends or spend on stock buybacks.
