SiliconBeat

Cisco Systems, the San Jose networking giant, said Thursday that the compensation committee of its board of directors approved its “fiscal 2009 merit-based granting” to eligible employees of restricted stock units good for about 28 million shares. The committee also approved “merit-based right to receive future grants of performance-based restricted stock units for certain employees, based on Cisco’s financial performance in fiscal 2009, in a target amount of approximately 3 million restricted stock units.”

That adds up to approximately 31 million shares, which had a combined value of about $715 million as of Thursday’s close.

During its last fiscal year ended in July, Cisco spent $10.4 billion of its cash to buy back 372 million of its own shares at an average price of $27.80 per share. Did it overpay? Cisco shares are currently trading around $23, down 15 percent so far this year.

Since it first began buying back its own shares in 2001, Cisco has repurchased and retired 2.6 billion of its own shares at an average price of $20.60 per share.