Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities

Market Information for Common Stock

Our common stock trades on the NYSE under the symbol “IQV.” The following table sets forth the high and low sales prices per share of our common stock as reported by the NYSE for the periods indicated.

Holders of Record

On February 12, 2018, we had approximately 46 stockholders of record as reported by our transfer agent. Holders of record are defined as those stockholders whose shares are registered in their names in our stock records and do not include beneficial owners of common stock whose shares are held in the names of brokers, dealers or clearing agencies.

Dividend Policy

We do not currently intend to pay dividends on our common stock, and no dividends were declared or paid in 2017 or 2016. However, we expect to reevaluate our dividend policy on a regular basis and may, subject to compliance with the covenants contained in our credit facilities and other considerations, determine to pay dividends in the future. The declaration, amount and payment of any future dividends on shares of our common stock will be at the sole discretion of our Board, which may take into account general and economic conditions, our financial condition and results of operations, our available cash and current and anticipated cash needs, capital requirements, contractual, legal, tax and regulatory restrictions, the implications of the payment of dividends by us to our stockholders or by our subsidiaries to us, and any other factors that our Board may deem relevant. Our long-term debt arrangements contain usual and customary restrictive covenants that, among other things, place limitations on our ability to declare dividends. For additional information regarding these restrictive covenants, see Part II, Item 7 “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources” and Note 11 to our audited consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Recent Sales of Unregistered Securities

We did not sell any unregistered equity securities in 2017.

Purchases of Equity Securities by the Issuer

On October 30, 2013, our Board approved the repurchase program authorizing the repurchase of up to $125.0 million of either our common stock or vested in-the-money employee stock options, or a combination thereof (the “Repurchase Program”). Our Board increased the stock repurchase authorization under the Repurchase Program with respect to the repurchase of our common stock by $600.0 million, $1.5 billion, $1.0 billion and $1.0 billion in 2015, November 2016, February 2017 and May 2017, respectively, which increased the total amount that has been authorized under the Repurchase Program to $4.225 billion. The Repurchase Program does not obligate us to repurchase any particular amount of common stock or vested in-the-money employee stock options, and it may be modified, suspended or discontinued at any time. The timing and amount of repurchases are determined by our management based on a variety of factors such as the market price of our common stock, our corporate requirements, and overall market conditions. Purchases of our common stock may be made in open market transactions effected through a broker-dealer at prevailing market prices, in block trades, or in privately negotiated transactions. We may also repurchase shares of our common stock pursuant to a trading plan meeting the requirements of Rule 10b5-1 under the Exchange Act, which would permit shares of our common stock to be repurchased when we might otherwise be precluded from doing so by law. Repurchases of vested in-the-money employee stock options were made through transactions between us and our employees (other than our executive officers, who were not eligible to participate in the program), and this aspect of the Repurchase Program expired in November 2013. The Repurchase Program for common stock does not have an expiration date.

Since the Merger, we repurchased 43.7 million shares of our common stock at an average market price per share of $82.76 for an aggregate purchase price of $3,620 million both under and outside of the Repurchase Program. These amounts include 9,677,420 shares of our common stock which we repurchased from certain of our principal stockholders in a private transaction for approximately $750 million and 10,071,003 shares of our common stock which we repurchased directly from underwriters in connection with three separate underwritten, secondary public offerings of shares of our common stock held by certain of our principal stockholders for approximately $935 million in the aggregate in May, September and November 2017. For additional information regarding our equity repurchases, see Part II, Item 7 “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources” and Note 14 to our audited consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

From inception of the Repurchase Program through December 31, 2017, we have repurchased a total of $4,043 million of our securities under the Repurchase Program consisting of $59 million of stock options and $3,984 million of common stock. As of December 31, 2017, we have remaining authorization to repurchase up to $182 million of our common stock under the Repurchase Program. In addition, from time to time, we have repurchased and may continue to repurchase common stock through private or other transactions outside of the Repurchase Program. On February 14, 2018, the Board authorized an increase in the post-merger share repurchase authorization by $1.5 billion to a total of $5.0 billion, with $1.7 billion authorization remaining.

The following table summarizes the monthly equity repurchase program activity for the three months ended December 31, 2017 and the approximate dollar value of shares that may yet be purchased pursuant to the Repurchase Program. In addition, the table includes shares repurchased outside the Repurchase Program and shares withheld from employees to satisfy certain tax obligations due in connection with grants of stock under the Quintiles IMS Holdings, Inc. 2017 Incentive and Stock Award Plan (“the Plan”). The Plan provides for the withholding of shares to satisfy tax obligations. It does not specify a maximum number of shares that can be withheld for this purpose. The shares of common stock withheld to satisfy tax withholding obligations may be deemed to be “issuer purchases” of shares that are required to be disclosed pursuant to this Item.

(1) During the three months ended December 31, 2017, the Company repurchased 2.5 million shares outside the Repurchase program which were retired and approximately 0.1 million shares were withheld from employees to satisfy certain tax obligations due in connection with grants of stock under the Plan.

During the year ended December 31, 2017, we repurchased 30.9 million shares of our common stock at an average market price per share of $84.80 for an aggregate purchase price of $2,620 million both under and outside of the Repurchase Program, which includes approximately 19.7 million shares from our sponsors.

Stock Performance Graph

This performance graph shall not be deemed “filed” for purposes of Section 18 of the Exchange Act, or incorporated by reference into any filing of IQVIA Holdings Inc. under the Exchange Act or under the Securities Act, except as shall be expressly set forth by specific reference in such filing.

The following graph shows a comparison from May 9, 2013 (the date our common stock commenced trading on the NYSE) through December 31, 2017 of the cumulative total return for our common stock, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Stock Index (“S&P 500”) and a select peer group. The peer group consists of Cerner Corporation, Charles River Laboratories, Inc., Dun & Bradstreet Corporation, Equifax Inc., ICON plc, IHS Markit Ltd., Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings, Nielsen N.V., PRA Health Sciences, Inc., Syneos Health (formerly INC Research Holdings), Thomson Reuters Corporation and Verisk Analytics, Inc. The companies in our peer group are publicly traded information services, information technology or contract research companies, and thus share similar business model characteristics to IQVIA, or provide services to similar customers as IQVIA. Many of these companies are also used by our compensation committee for purposes of compensation benchmarking.

The graph assumes that $100 was invested in IQVIA, the S&P 500 and the peer group as of the close of market on May 9, 2013, assumes the reinvestments of dividends, if any. The S&P 500 and our peer group are included for comparative purposes only. They do not necessarily reflect management’s opinion that the S&P 500 and our peer group are an appropriate measure of the relative performance of the stock involved, and they are not intended to forecast or be indicative of possible future performance of our common stock.