Shareholder yield measures the cash paid out both as dividends and as stock buybacks.

Shareholder Yield = Dividend Yield + Buyback Yield

Buyback Yield = Change in Number of Shares Outstanding ÷ Previous Number of Shares Outstanding

Shareholder yield can be looked at in addition to the dividend yield to see what kind of a return the shareholder will receive through the company’s capital allocation policy.  

A study by Wesley Gray and Jack Vogel of Alpha Architect (“Enhancing the Investment Performance of Yield-Based Strategies,” SSRN, 2012) found that stocks with shareholder yields ranking in the top 40% experienced higher annualized returns, particularly those ranking in the top 20%.