Google did a clever math trick when figuring out how much stock to buy back

Alphabet, the new parent company that counts Google as its subsidiary, has announced that it will undertake a monster $5 billion stock buyback starting in the fourth quarter.

It's a clever move on Google's part - but not just because it benefits the company by giving it more control over its stock price, since it lowers the number of shares out in the market.

There's a small Easter egg hidden in the announcement.

The exact number Google chose for its buyback is precise: $5,099,019,513.59. That number happens to be the square root of 26 times a billion- as several math-savvy Twitter users first noticed.

Twenty-six also happens to be the number of letters in the alphabet.

This isn't the first time Google has tucked a clever math trick into its business. In 2011, when Google was bidding for Nortel Networks' wireless patents, it offered interesting numbers, such as pi.