UK Firms and Trusts Announce Buybacks; OSE Restates

On 23–24 September 2025 multiple UK-listed companies and investment trusts announced share buybacks or repurchases, with transactions either cancelled or placed into treasury as part of ongoing programmes and balance-sheet management. Imperial Brands continued its £1.25bn repurchase programme with further cancellations leaving 807,805,510 ordinary shares in issue, while Auto Trader and Elementis completed buybacks for cancellation (Auto Trader repurchased at an average 770.1722p leaving 874,423,621 shares in issue and 5,229,626 in treasury; Elementis left 577,113,375 shares in issue). Standard Chartered disclosed aggregate buybacks totalling US$342.8m to be cancelled leaving 2,297,210,746 shares in issue, and BP purchased 950,000 shares with the intention to transfer them into treasury. Several investment trusts also reported purchases into treasury, including Schroder AsiaPacific (100,000 cancelled at 642.72p), JPMorgan Global Emerging Markets Income Trust (161,280 to treasury at 158.00p), Personal Assets Trust (30,000 to treasury), Scot Mortgages/Scot Mort Inv Trust (500,000 to treasury), and updated treasury/voting totals for F&C Investment Trust, Global Smaller Companies Trust and Rathbones. IP Group completed repurchases leaving 897,223,908 ordinary shares in issue. OSE Immunotherapeutics corrected a processing error that accelerated vesting of 546,919 free shares, restating outstanding shares at 22,463,262 and theoretical voting rights at 27,859,524 while denying allegations of fraudulent manipulation.