Edinburgh-based investment giant Standard Life Aberdeen said on Friday it has launched the latest stage of its massive share buyback programme.

The latest stage involves buying back £200 million of stock by January 16, 2020.

“At the company’s General Meeting on 25 June 2018, shareholders approved the return of up to £1.75bn in aggregate to shareholders, subject to necessary regulatory approvals,” said Standard Life Aberdeen.

“This included a return of capital of £1bn via a B Share Scheme – which completed on 22 October 2018 – and a return of up to £750m by a share buyback programme.

“On 2 April 2019 the company announced the commencement of the third tranche of the share buyback programme. 

“This has now completed and resulted in the repurchase, and cancellation, of 97,642,646 ordinary shares for a total consideration of £175m.  

“To date the company has repurchased 235,847,839 ordinary shares for a total consideration of £550m.”

On the latest move, Standard Life Aberdeen said: “On 15 August 2019, the company entered into a non-discretionary instruction with Citigroup Global Markets Limited (Citi) in relation to the purchase by Citi, acting as principal, of ordinary shares in the company’s share capital for an aggregate consideration of no greater than £200m.

“The purchase of shares will take place during the period commencing on 16 August 2019 and ending no later than 16 January 2020 …

“The purpose of the programme is to reduce the share capital of the company. All shares purchased will be cancelled.

“The total number of voting rights in the company as at 15 August 2019 is 2,409,829,466.”