[refulgentis]

This is a good Q, I didn't know the view in the other reply, at least specifically. In general I know profit : stock price is necessary for calculating rate of return.

my dumber answer is "only if dividends and buybacks exceed profit sustainably", which is an oxymoron eschewing extreme circumstances (taking on debt at that you won't pay back, or being offered debt at 0% interest despite the fact you're giving it away)

There's lots from there (ex. couldn't we pull that off? Bank doesn't know we're liquidating if we don't tell them) -- in general the abstraction finance uses is "is the rate of return higher than bonds?", which of course is true in the short run in this extreme of a scenario, but unlikely in the long run