Syngenta has opened the door to increasing its buyback programme unveiled a month ago, while dampening speculation it may be planning to buy as much as 9.5m shares

The Swiss seeds and sprays groups has, in a filing, shown it is prepared to purchase at least 10% of its stock by the end of 2012.

Buybacks at that levels would be worth some SFr2.9bn ($2.7bn) at current market prices. Syngenta guided last month to buybacks of roughly SFr200m this year.

"[The filing] implies that guidance given at the 2009 results last month for a modest 2010 buyback has been increased substantially," analysts at Icap, the London broker, said.

"This news… reduces the probability that Syngenta will execute a major strategic, and potentially dilutive, acquisition in the foreseeable future."

'Larger threshold'

A Syngenta spokesman told Agrimoney.com that last month's buyback guidance still held, adding that the 10% the figure had been chosen for legal reasons

Nonetheless, the "larger threshold" did leave elbow room for bigger buybacks, being designed so that staff were "not always running back to the board if we do any more than SFr200m in future", the spokesman said.

Syngenta spent some $2bn on buybacks between 2004 and 2008, before suspending them last year amid the global recession and as a potential sale of Dow Chemical's agriculture division loomed.

Potato breakthrough 

Icap in its note restated a "buy" rating on Syngenta shares, adding that the group's prospects had also been boosted by European Commission approval last week – after 13 years - of a genetically modified potato.

While the variety was developed by BASF, the approval provided a boost to all producers of genetically modified seed, including Syngenta, which have suffered severe hold-ups winning approval in Europe against negative public opinion about GM foods.

"We see this news as consistent with our thesis that the progressive introduction of GM in Europe is inevitable over the medium-long term which would be a major positive for Syngenta," Icap said.

A further 17 GM seed types are in the pipeline for potential approval for cultivation within the EU, with 44 products awaiting authorisation for import and processing, according to biotech industry association EuropaBio.

BASF developed its potato for industrial use, to provide starch for use as a thickening agent for paper, adhesives and textiles.

Syngenta closed down SFr0.30 at SFr302.60.