> When the company makes money they pay you cash as a dividend (for tax reasons this most often comes in the form of a stock buy back [...])

Often?

"Nearly 75% of the stocks in the S&P 500 pay a dividend, and the dividend for most of them exceeds the yield on U.S. 10-year Treasury bonds (currently around 2%)"[0]

[0] https://cabotwealth.com/daily/dividend-stocks/highest-paying...