Shareholders’ equity and earnings per share

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2019

Shareholders' equity and earnings per share

Shareholders’ equity and earnings per share

Stock repurchases

The Company occasionally repurchases shares of its common stock to satisfy employee tax withholding obligations in association with the exercise of stock appreciation rights, restricted stock, and performance-based stock awards. These repurchases, which are not part of a publicly announced plan or program, totaled 169,290 shares during 2019, 266,652 shares during 2018, and 119,349 shares during 2017, at a cost of $9,608, $14,561 and $6,335, respectively.

On February 10, 2016, the Company’s Board of Directors authorized the repurchase of up to 5,000,000 shares of the Company’s common stock. During 2016, a total of 2,030,389 shares were repurchased under this authorization at a cost of $100,000. No shares were repurchased during 2017 and 2018. Accordingly, at December 31, 2019, a total of 2,969,611 shares remain available for repurchase under this authorization.

Earnings per share

The following table sets forth the computation of basic and diluted earnings per share (in thousands, except per share data):


	2019		2018		2017
Numerator:
Net income attributable to Sonoco	$	291,785	$	313,560	$	175,345
Denominator:
Weighted average common shares outstanding	100,742		100,539		100,237
Dilutive effect of stock-based compensation	434		477		615
Diluted outstanding shares	101,176		101,016		100,852
Per common share:
Net income attributable to Sonoco:
Basic	$	2.90	$	3.12	$	1.75
Diluted	$	2.88	$	3.10	$	1.74
Cash dividends	$	1.70	$	1.62	$	1.54

No adjustments were made to reported net income in the computation of earnings per share.

Potentially dilutive securities are calculated in accordance with the treasury stock method, which assumes the proceeds from the exercise of all dilutive stock appreciation rights (SARs) are used to repurchase the Company’s common stock. Certain SARs are not dilutive because either the exercise price is greater than the average market price of the stock during the reporting period or assumed repurchases from proceeds from the exercise of the SARs were antidilutive.

The average number of shares that were not dilutive and therefore not included in the computation of diluted income per share was as follows for the years ended December 31, 2019, 2018 and 2017 (in thousands):


	2019	2018	2017
Anti-dilutive stock appreciation rights	475	786	487

These stock appreciation rights may become dilutive in future periods if the market price of the Company’s common stock appreciates.

Noncontrolling interests

In 1994, the Company entered into a joint venture agreement with two partners in Asia for the manufacturing and marketing of products in the Asian markets. Prior to December 31, 2018, the Company owned a controlling interest of 79.25% of the joint venture and consolidated the net assets of the Asia joint venture. On December 31, 2018, the Company acquired the 19.08% ownership interest of PFE Hong Kong Limited, one of the joint venture partners, for $35,000 in cash, bringing the Company’s total ownership in the Asia joint venture to 98.33%. As a result of the purchase, the Company wrote off the $11,695 book value of the noncontrolling interest and recorded a $23,305 reduction in Capital in Excess of Stated Value. One of the Company's directors, Harry A. Cockrell, is a principal shareholder of PFE Hong Kong Limited.

On October 1, 2018, the Company completed the acquisition of the remaining 70% interest in Conitex Sonoco (see Note 3). The acquisition of Conitex Sonoco included joint ventures in Indonesia and China in which the Company owns a controlling interest. The noncontrolling interests relating to these joint ventures were recorded on the opening balance sheet at their fair value of $2,655.

During the third quarter of 2017, the Company recorded a $1,341 noncontrolling interest related to the creation of a joint venture for the manufacture of tubes and cores from a facility in Saudi Arabia. The Company owns a 51% share in the joint venture and the assets have been consolidated.