LONDON, March 31, 2026, 17:10 BST
RELX repurchased 3.43 million shares from March 23 through March 27, kicking off the initial week of its latest 350 million pound buyback initiative, according to a company filing. The shares, bought at the reported prices, came to roughly 83.5 million pounds and will be held in treasury instead of being released immediately to the market.
This is notable, with the LexisNexis parent only a few weeks into a pledged £2.25 billion buyback program slated for 2026—a hefty payout as shareholders weigh just how resilient growth will be in legal, risk, and science information, especially as AI tools roll out. RELX claims the very tech shaking up the industry can actually make its own offerings more valuable to customers.
RELX’s annual general meeting and trading update land on April 23, offering investors an early look at whether the company’s 2025 momentum kept up into this year.
This round of buybacks stretches from March 23 through April 22, right after RELX wrapped up its previous £450 million programme on March 20. J.P. Morgan Securities handles the transactions, sticking to preset criteria. RELX said it would release updates every week.
Following its most recent round of buying, RELX’s treasury stock climbed to 35.16 million shares, with 1.793 billion shares remaining in issue, not counting those held in treasury. Since Jan. 2, the company has bought back 31.06 million shares, according to the March 30 filing.
RELX posted 2025 revenue of 9.59 billion pounds in February, with adjusted operating profit landing at 3.34 billion pounds. Cash conversion hit 99%—almost every pound of profit showed up as cash. Chief Executive Erik Engstrom pointed to artificial intelligence as a major growth engine, saying it would keep powering gains “for many years to come.”
The debate over the stock turns on that point. Back in February, Reuters flagged rising concern after Anthropic rolled out a legal AI plug-in—RELX, along with Thomson Reuters and Wolters Kluwer, took a hit. But Chief Financial Officer Nick Luff countered, saying RELX’s proprietary algorithms and real-time content updates offer a competitive edge.
Even so, buybacks leave the broader issue unresolved. Back in February, Ben Snider, chief U.S. equity strategist at Goldman Sachs, called near-term earnings “important signals of business resilience” for software and data stocks. Still, he noted those results may not put to rest the lingering fears about longer-term AI risks. Reuters
RELX points to its “strong financial position and cash flow” to justify the share buybacks slated for 2026. Investors will get their next look at how that argument lands on April 23.
