Apples USD 110 billion share buyback, good for shareholders, but shows business growth is slowing

If a company was growing quickly, and planning to grow quickly in the future, it would reinvest it's excess cash into the company, including R&D, to develop new technologies and products. Apple's share buyback, shows that the era of fast sales and income growth for Apple is over. Apple is now a mature company with high margin products generating excess cash.

According to Reuters: "Apple increased its cash dividend by 4% and authorized an additional program to buy back $110 billion of stock. The buyback is the largest in the company's history."

And it's market capitalisation increased by USD 160 billion. So it was a good investment for Apple for their shareholders.

What about stakeholder capitalism? Couldn't it have used some of the cash for employee bonuses and benefits? And reinvested some of it into AI, in which it is behind companies like Google and Samsung?

Reference: https://www.reuters.com/technology/apple-unveils-record-110-billion-buyback-results-beat-low-expectations-2024-05-02/