No, if the company buys on the open market the OS does not change; they can just sit on those shares and resell them at a later time. They need to actually 'retire' those shares, my guess is that they need to contact the TA and specifically request that shares be retired. Hmm, wonder if the TA requires certs! LOL... Seriously, the TA can 'retire' the shares and thus affect the defined OS, but if MM's sell phantom shares anyway, how much of a difference does it make? Is the difference mainly psychological? Mainly one of definition when computing EPS and other metrics?
