Further share buy-back scheduled

Home Depot is setting aside a further US $ 2 bn for buying back shares. This means an increase of total volume from US $ 12 bn to 14 bn. From the beginning of the share buy-back programme in 2002 until the end of April 2006 the company spent over US $ 10.3 bn on buying back 291 mio shares. For the present scheme an agreement has been reached with Lehman Brothers on the immediate acquisition of about 53 mio shares, by means of which it is expected to increase the total number of repurchased shares to 344 mio, corresponding to around 15 per cent of the volume of shares issued.