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Owens Corning (OC)

Q1 2020 Earnings Call· Wed, Apr 29, 2020

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, and welcome to the Owens Corning First Quarter 2020 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Scott Cripps, VP of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Scott Cripps

Analyst

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for taking the time to join us for today's conference call and review of our business results for the first quarter 2020. Joining us today are Brian Chambers, Owens Corning's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Prith Gandhi, our Interim Chief Financial Officer. Following our presentation this morning, we will open this 1 hour call to your questions. [Operator Instructions]. Earlier this morning, we issued a news release and filed a 10-Q that detailed our financial results for the first quarter 2020. For the purposes of our discussion today, we've prepared presentation slides that summarize our performance and results, and we will refer to these slides during the call. You can access the earnings press release, Form 10-Q and presentation slides at our website, owenscorning.com. Refer to the Investors link under the Corporate section of our home page. A transcript and recording of this call and the supporting slides will be available on our website for future reference. Please reference Slide 2 before we begin, where we offer a couple of reminders. First, today's remarks will include forward-looking statements based on our current forecasts and estimates of future events. These statements are subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially. We undertake no obligation to update these statements beyond what is required under the applicable securities laws. Please refer to the cautionary statements and the risk factors identified in our SEC filings for a more detailed explanation of the inherent risks and uncertainties affecting such forward-looking statements. Second, the presentation slides and today's remarks contain non-GAAP financial measures. Explanations and reconciliations of non-GAAP to GAAP measures may be found in the text and financial tables of our earnings press release and presentation, both of which are available on owenscorning.com. Adjusted EBIT is our primary measure of period-over-period comparisons, and we believe it's a meaningful measure for investors to compare our results. Consistent with our historical practice, we have excluded certain items that we believe are not representative of our ongoing operations when calculating adjusted EBIT and adjusted earnings. We adjust our effective tax rate to remove the effect of quarter-to-quarter fluctuations, which have the potential to be significant in arriving at adjusted earnings and adjusted earnings per share. We also use free cash flow and free cash flow conversion of adjusted earnings as measures to help investors to evaluate the company's ability to generate cash and utilize that cash to pursue opportunities that enhance shareholder value. For those of you following along with our slide presentation, we'll begin on Slide 4. And now opening remarks from our Chairman and CEO, Brian Chambers, who will be followed by interim CFO, Prith Gandhi. Then Brian will cover our outlook before the Q&A session. Brian?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Thanks, Scott. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. All of us are dealing with the unprecedented challenges and impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. It has and will continue to change how we live and work. But extraordinary times create the opportunity for extraordinary actions, and that is what we are seeing in communities around the world as we work together to take care of those in need, ensure essential businesses are operating and take the necessary precautions to prevent the spread of this devastating virus. Within Owens Corning, our teams around the globe have responded to this crisis with compassion and result. Through the many individual acts of support, including the work of the OC Foundation, we will continue to offer our help as a company. And to everyone who has been directly or indirectly affected by the virus, our sincerest wish is for a full and fast recovery for you and your loved ones. Given the current environment, I will make a few comments on our first quarter safety results and financial performance, but we'll spend a majority of my time on how we are managing our business through the COVID-19 pandemic. Prith will then provide some additional details on the first quarter, and then I'll come back to discuss our views on the second quarter and the remainder of the year. Our commitment to safety is unconditional. In the first quarter, our recordable incident rate was 0.47, a 37% improvement compared with the same quarter in 2019. I'm very pleased with this performance, in that everyone has remained focused on creating an injury-free workplace during this difficult time. Financially, for the quarter, we delivered results in line with the expectations we outlined during our last earnings call, despite the additional market impact from the COVID-19…

Prithvi Gandhi

Analyst

Thank you, Brian, and good morning, everyone. As Brian mentioned, we find ourselves managing through unprecedented events. I am thankful for the strength of our colleagues across the globe who are all dealing with the difficulties of the COVID-19 pandemic. Driven by their efforts, the company delivered strong performance in the first quarter in the face of challenging market conditions. Please turn to Slide 6, which summarizes key financial data for the first quarter of 2020. The tables in today's news release and the Form 10-Q include more detailed financial information. For the first quarter, we reported consolidated net sales of $1.6 billion, down about 3% versus 2019 on a constant currency basis. Lower Roofing volumes drove the majority of the decline due to lower storm demand carryover and reduced shipments to distributors. Adjusted EBIT for the first quarter of 2020 was $116 million, flat to the prior year as a $24 million performance improvement in Insulation was offset by lower EBIT in Composites and Roofing. Net earnings attributable to Owens Corning for the first quarter of 2020 was a $917 million loss compared to $44 million of net earnings in Q1 2019, primarily due to impairment charges that I will discuss in a moment. Adjusted earnings for the first quarter were $65 million or $0.60 per diluted share compared to $58 million or $0.53 per diluted share in Q1 2019. Depreciation and amortization expense for the quarter was $116 million, up slightly as compared to Q1 2019 due to accelerated depreciation from the insulation restructuring actions announced last October. Our capital additions for the first quarter were $54 million, down approximately $25 million versus 2019. On Slide 7, you will see our adjusting items, reconciling our first quarter 2020 adjusted EBIT of $116 million to our reported EBIT loss…

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Thank you, Prith. As I mentioned earlier, I'm proud of how our team has performed in this very challenging environment. We have clear operating priorities to manage the business in both the near and longer term, all aimed at creating value for our shareholders. We have market leading businesses, innovative products and process technologies and an enterprise model that creates differentiated value. And we have a strong team in place, dedicated to the success of our customers and our shareholders. We have taken decisive actions that will position us to perform well in the various market conditions we could face over the balance of this year and into 2021. As we move through the year, our performance will continue to be influenced by several market factors, including global industrial production, U.S. housing starts and global commercial and industrial construction activity. Our full year financial performance will be impacted by the depth and duration of the market disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Given the continued uncertainty we face with federal, state, local and foreign governmental actions in response to managing through the pandemic, I'll focus my comments on our short-term outlook based upon the trends we experienced in April that will impact the second quarter results for each of our businesses. I'll then close with my perspectives on a few key enterprise-wide initiatives and the impact they could have on our full year performance. I'll start with our Insulation business and the impact we are seeing in both our North American residential fiberglass business and our global technical insulation businesses. Within our North American residential business, we expect that the shelter-in-place restrictions will delay completions of builds and extend the normal lag times we see to insulate a home. While we would normally expect strong volume growth tied to increasing…

Scott Cripps

Analyst

Thank you, Brian. We'll now open the call for questions.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions]. The first question today comes from Kathryn Thompson of Thompson Research.

Kathryn Thompson

Analyst

First focusing on Composites and understanding that's going to have a greater impact to the company's results, most likely for the remainder of this year and into 2021. Could you break out, in terms of -- I appreciate the detail, but if you could break out in greater color from the geographic impact in terms of volumes and relative earnings headwinds? And what have you seen out of Asia as they are a little bit further along in the recovery? And then also give a look, particularly, into Europe and how they're responding to lower demand and how that impacts Composites?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Good morning, Kathryn. Thanks for the question. So on Composites, I guess, when we start talking about our performance outlook for Q2, I guess, I'd want to start by saying, look, this is very going to be volume dependent in terms of our performance in our businesses, and that includes Composites. So our performance in Q2 isn't necessarily indicative of what may materialize through the back half of the year into 2021, but it's certainly our near-term outlook in terms of how we're looking at the business. So as you said, Kathryn, we've got a pretty diverse mix regionally and by end market applications. And I'd say in our Composites business, what has held up very well over the last year and including in the first quarter, is our strategic areas of focus around really focusing in on some key geographies where we have market leadership, great product process technologies, great customer support. And that's in North America, Europe, India. We do have business in China there, but it's to a much lesser extent. But when we take a look at our April volumes in terms of how those materialized, I think North America and Europe for us were performing very well through the first quarter. But clearly, our Composites business and then also our Roofing business was probably the most impacted by some of the March shelter-in-place orders in Europe and then in North America that we saw play out. So when we look at volumes in Composites being down about 25% here in April, I'd share with you, geographically, it started to impact in Europe. And if you look, Europe is about 30% of our business. So we've seen order volumes tracking pretty consistent with the overall outlook we gave in Europe in terms of what those tracked…

Operator

Operator

The next question today comes from Mike Wood of Nomura Instinet.

Michael Wood

Analyst

Thanks for providing all the data on April. I appreciate it. Can you talk about your Insulation and Composite business, the exposure that you have facing energy markets? And perhaps also just Pittsburgh Corning specifically, which I recall has LNG exposure. Just if you could talk about what you're seeing there? What steps you're taking maybe to adjust to potential declines in that business?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Thanks, Mike. Yes, in terms of the energy markets overall, clearly, the dislocation we've seen in oil is going to start to have an impact rolling through both our Composites business and a little bit in the Insulation business. I'd say, in Composites, it's probably more near-term impact in terms of how materials are consumed in the operations. And we would expect that's going to have an impact here in Q2 and then for the foreseeable future until there's some stabilization in the oil markets. With regards to Insulation, and particularly to FOAMGLAS, that is a business that does a lot in the industrial segment. I'd share with you that for the most part, our materials go into projects towards the end stages of those projects. So we've seen some delays in those construction time lines, but not any cancellations. So in the near term, kind of through this year, we would expect that we're going to see those projects get completed. And then what we're going to be watching really is kind of how this could potentially impact as we go into '21, '22 in terms of any capital expenditure changes around oil or natural gas facilities. But for this year, we think it's probably not going to have as big of an impact because those projects are well in place and progressing. And again, we come in at the tail end of that.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Matthew Bouley of Barclays.

Matthew Bouley

Analyst

I wanted to ask for a little more color around the decremental margins across the business, sort of beyond the second quarter. I'm trying to understand sort of what level of cost is more fixed in the very near term, kind of, amidst this quick volume drop off? What can you flex kind of in the next few months so that -- or at least sort of what could that mean for decremental margins beyond the second quarter as you flex your costs?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes. Thanks, Matt. Again, our decremental margins outlook in Q2 is very much depending on kind of looking through at the volume declines that we're seeing in April, that could continue through the rest of the quarter. But our decremental margins, as we go forward, are going to be very dependent on the volume and demands that materialize for our business. So I think in the near term, a lot of these margin deterioration is really being caused by the fixed cost assets that we have. So while every business is going to get impacted by volume declines here in the second quarter, certainly, our Composites and our Insulation business, our glass melting businesses, where fixed cost absorption is so much higher, we're going to see more decremental margin deterioration. And how we're looking at those is for -- right now, we're looking at curtailing these operations, so we can take some cost out in terms of energy and raw materials, while we're idling these facilities. But we're going to maintain the bulk of the energy cost, the bulk of the labor cost as we continue to hot idle these assets and get a clearer view to how the second half is going to materialize. So in the near term, those are going to be pretty fixed costs that are in the business that we're going to absorb to the P&L. Longer term, we can take other actions around taking furnaces cold or taking lines cold, which we've done in the past, and that would remove a lot of the other energy costs and other associated operating costs with that. But right now, these margins are really a good indication of what we would see in the second quarter based on certain volume decline and then based on us holding a lot of these assets hot idle while we see how the second half volume environment materializes.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Stephen Kim of Evercore ISI.

Stephen Kim

Analyst

Appreciate all the color. Obviously, really difficult environment and your outlook, I think, sufficiently paints that picture. But there were some things that were mentioned in your Q that I thought were -- I was hoping you could elaborate on a little bit, in particular, related to favorable manufacturing performance across all 3 of your divisions: Insulation, Composites and Roofing. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit more about that, specifically, what were they related to so that we can get a sense for how the COVID environment that we're in may influence that, whether they were -- whether you would see reductions in the benefits from those improvements or if there was something about the way that going into this COVID environment cause those manufacturing performance improvements to actually increase as you made your way through the quarter? I just -- any more color you can provide on that and what we can expect going forward would be helpful.

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes. Thanks, Stephen. Our focus really on improving our manufacturing performance was one of the key operating priorities that I talked about last year, which is driving improved operating efficiency. So we have been hard at work for the last several years around improving our manufacturing efficiencies overall across the company through uses of advanced manufacturing techniques, other operating disciplines. And so the results that we delivered in terms of manufacturing performance in Q1 is very indicative of what we were delivering last year. And we think those are not COVID-19 dependent. Those are just good focused actions we are taking every day to improve unit cost productivity, to become more efficient, to reduce maintenance costs across the enterprise. So I think that is actually good solid work that is going to continue. I think that has helped to offset some of the curtailment costs that we are also absorbing because we're able to just generate good unit cost productivity, and that's going to continue going forward. And I think that's going to be a benefit as we start to see volumes improve in terms of incremental operating margin improvement in our glass melting businesses. I think we're going to have a better manufacturing cost base as we go forward, and that's going to help our margin improvements as we come through this and start to see volume improvements across the businesses.

Operator

Operator

Next question comes from Mike Dahl of RBC Capital Markets.

Michael Dahl

Analyst

So just in terms of some of the April commentary when we're thinking through some of these volume declines and incrementals that you're speaking to in 2Q, it seems like it's putting the consolidated business at or maybe slightly above breakeven from an EBIT standpoint. So, a, just wanted to kind of confirm that that's fair based on what you're saying. And then, b, I guess the bigger question is, it speaks to Steve's question as well. When you think about last cycle, obviously, your high fixed cost businesses like Insulation, Composites had some down years for -- from an adjusted EBIT standpoint. There have been significant changes to those businesses over the past cycle. But on the flip side, we're in another kind of synchronized downturn across regions, across end markets today. So just wanted to get your thoughts on just those businesses, Composites and Insulation, their ability to remain profitable in the current environment.

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes, that's a great question. Thanks. I think on the quarter, in terms of consolidated, I'd say, the overall operating profitability is going to be very, very dependent on the volumes that materialize and how quickly markets reopen. So that's going to be the biggest driver, I think, of some of the profitability inside Insulation and Composites on the volume piece. But our focus is -- in this quarter and going forward is really on generating great and solid free cash flow by managing the items we can control, really good OpEx reductions, minimizing CapEx, really managing our working capital inventories tightly so we can generate good free cash flow through this quarter and going into the back half of the year. So the EBIT performance is going to be dependent on volumes. But our free cash flow performance, we feel, is going to be very solid as we go through the quarter and into the back half of the year. I think with regard to your other question, maybe back to Stephen's a little bit on just how things might have changed. I think the -- our glass melting businesses, both Composites and Insulation, there's been a lot of work in terms of improving our cost position in both the business, certainly since the last downturn. In our residential insulation business, I think some of the cost actions that we talked about last year, where we've reduced capacity, we've improved manufacturing productivity efficiencies, I think we've really restructured the res part of the Insulation business in a way that although has a lower cost base and allows us to produce profitability at a lower housing start base and certainly what we were looking at in terms of the last housing recession. So I think we're better positioned there. I…

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Phil Ng of Jefferies.

Philip Ng

Analyst

Curious how are your inventory levels kind of holding up for your Insulation business? And appreciating starts are probably going to be down pretty noticeably in April, how much backlog do you still have? Because your commentary around April certainly sounded better than most of us probably expected.

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes. So thanks. I think when you look inside our quarterly just overall inventory levels at a dollar value, we were pretty flat in terms of where we finished the year. I'd say that our inventory positions, we're in very good position in Insulation. We worked some down. I think we saw a little bit of inventories in Roofing really because the volumes and shipments started to decline in the back half of March. And normally, we are running our production in Roofing to build up for the seasonal demand we expect. So when demand kind of dropped off a little bit in Roofing at the end of March, we saw some inventory build that we've corrected with some of the curtailment actions we've taken here in April. So I think that's going to be a continued key focus area for us as we're going to want to manage inventories very tightly. We want to make sure that we're not getting out ahead of demand in terms of building out inventories through the quarter or going into next year. So we're going to continue to manage inventories tightly. So we -- so we're prepared if volumes improve in the back half of the year, which we think there's a good possibility for that to occur, we can ramp up our operations and get good manufacturing efficiencies as we finish out the year.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Truman Patterson of Wells Fargo.

Truman Patterson

Analyst

Glad to hear everybody's healthy. So first, with all the productivity initiatives, it's nice to hear that Insulation decremental op margins are only down 40%. We were expecting something a little more severe. But looking at the residential side, clearly, U.S. resi slowed meaningfully. Could you just give an update on April pricing, whether pricing has started to roll back? And then also looking out into late 2020 and 2021, I know some competitors were bringing on some supply. I'm just hoping you can give an update of how you think supply kind of plays out in the next year or two.

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes. Thanks for the question, Truman. On pricing, again, as I said in my prepared comments, we've seen pricing through April remain relatively stable in the residential business. So we came into the year with light housing starts increasing and a good volume environment. We announced our January increase. We began realizing some of that pricing kind of through the P&L in Q1, and prices have maintained relatively good stability here through the month. So in terms of how this might play out through the rest of the year, we're going to continue to evaluate the markets. We'll keep a close eye. We'll keep competitive. And we'll respond accordingly. But right now, through the month, they've remained relatively stable. So -- and in regards to your question on the other kind of supply and capacity adds that are coming on stream, we really don't have -- I don't have any good feel or commentary on how they're going to be thinking about doing that. It's a very different environment when -- to when those capacity adds were announced. So we're going to have to wait and see in terms of if there are any announcements around what they do with those capacity adds as we get through the rest of the year. But so -- not sure how that could potentially impact '21 without knowing for sure if those adds are going to come on stream.

Operator

Operator

Next question comes from Justin Speer of Zelman & Associates.

Justin Speer

Analyst

So on the Roofing side, just I'd love some context and color on what you're seeing in April from a volume and pricing perspective, and just any sense -- if you can give us any sense for the inventory situations, how those are shaping up at Roofing currently?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes, thanks. So coming into the year, we felt like it was going to be another really strong Roofing year. So we said we thought volumes overall were going to be pretty flat with last year. And through the quarter, volumes were down a little bit year-over-year as we expected because we were bringing in a little less storm carryover. And we talked about that on the last call that that we felt was going to impact volumes. And I think volumes dropped in March more with response to just the shelter-in-place restrictions that were starting to get laid in, in the U.S. So I think that caused distributors that were buying from us, at least, to start to pull back on those purchases, to manage their inventories until there was a clearer picture of what the demand outlook might materialize over the quarter. So we saw that drop in our order book towards the end of March. In April, we've seen continued probably conservative buying as our distribution customers are kind of managing their inventories very tightly to expected demand. So that's why I believe in the quarter, as we sit here today, that our shipments as manufacturers will probably lag out-the-door sales. We have seen some trends that -- from our contractors that, that business is still continuing. A lot of the shelter-in-place restrictions deemed construction as essential, so that's allowed project work to occur, but concern over some of the lead generation and how that materializes in May and June. So again, I think what we're expecting is that we're going to see a bit of a slowdown here in Q2. Distributors manage inventories. But then as we get into the back half, we start seeing markets reopen. Roofing has proven to be a very resilient product. It's a nondiscretionary kind of investment in home. So as storm demand creates more demand for repairs and replacements, as we come into the second quarter or third quarter, and as people -- and as these shelter-in-place restrictions are lifted, we think that contractors are going to get back to work at a more robust level, and we're going to see some improvements in volumes as we come into the second half. But for the near term, I think they're going to continue to manage inventories, and we're expecting that in our order outlook of being down 30%. But again, that's very dependent on storm activity, which could accelerate and improve that, and it's very dependent on the pace of how states reopen and recovery starts, which could also improve that as we work through the quarter.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Michael Rehaut of JPMorgan.

Michael Rehaut

Analyst

I hope everyone is healthy and safe across your company. I just wanted to circle back to the comments around the Insulation business for a moment. And particularly around the volume commentary, certainly appreciate the prices and such. But when you talked about North American res, April volumes down about 10% year-over-year, and also on a global -- that the global business down 10% to 15%, for both of those businesses, you talked about kind of saying they could fall further as 2Q progresses. And I'd love to get a sense of what was driving those comments in terms of perhaps if a portion was more due to the fact that you're curtailing production in your facilities or facilities are kind of being shut down in Europe or different parts, so more from a production standpoint versus perhaps what you're seeing from an end demand standpoint? And if there's any way to kind of frame what the further drop could be as we look into May and June from that?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Okay. So to be clear, the commentary is more around the rate of market recovery and a demand comment, not anything tied to production. I think we're just looking at very much within the businesses how demand could materialize in May or June. I would say, both commentaries on it could decline further are really very dependent on how quickly states and/or countries in our technical insulation business reopen and the recovery efforts start. So again, the shelter-in-place restrictions that are in place today, if those remain and it get extended into May and into June, that's where we could see some decremental demand declines in terms of our volume outlook if -- in both residential and our technical business. So that's kind of the context for the statement. It's assuming that it takes a little while longer to get markets reopen and that the recovery slows. So on the res side, I'd share with you that the downward decline and where it could get potentially further decline is really tied to, again, shelter-in-place restrictions don't get listed -- don't get lifted, and then we see just the lag from housing start to completion of a home get extended because construction crews are limited to get on site and houses just take longer to build. So we see that extend and that impacts demand. And then I think any potential where there was a start that hasn't begun or isn't far along that might get delayed until a homeowner actually wants to buy the home, so it limits kind of spec building, that could further impact. So those are the possibilities. I would share with you, though, that as we come through this, we're in a different spot certainly than the last recessionary cycle because housing has not been overbuilt.…

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Ken Zener of KeyBanc.

Kenneth Zener

Analyst

Appreciate your comments. I just wanted to ask -- go to the fiberglass comments. Because we have very different regional trends in the U.S., and I'm located in the San Francisco area, which probably has the most extreme shelter-in-place, no construction allowed mandate. Can you talk about how these hot idles impact your network? I assume the Northern California plant is down because there's no construction as opposed to some other plants perhaps that are in better regions, South Central Texas or parts of Florida. That's the first part. So could you talk about how that hot idle works in terms of you managing the system and perhaps give us context in terms of how you think about demand versus your price point? And then, Prith, if you could just comment on the impairment a little further?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes. Thanks, Ken. I'll start, and I'll turn it over to Prith. So in terms of our operations, again, really points to the value of our products and how essential they are. I mean our products have been deemed essential in terms of the operations of our facilities. So even in Santa Clara in California, our operations has remained. And what we're looking about -- what we're looking at and talking about are curtailment actions really relative to the demand environment. So again, we're very focused in this environment to control the levers we can control around managing our cost position, maintaining tight inventories, good focus on working capital and maintaining and reducing CapEx to generate good cash flow. So we're being probably more proactive in terms of curtailment actions in our businesses across the board, our Insulation business, our Composites and our Roofing business, to make sure that we're not building inventory ahead of expected demand. So we're hot idling because we want to take temporary actions to minimize inventory, but that allows us the flexibility to ramp back up and get into full production very quickly depending on the market recovery rates that we see. So that's where we're going to balance. And we generally balance the hot idle in our furnaces for near-term demand disruptions. So again, we'll make those choices to manage inventories, and then we would have to -- we could make a different decision if we saw volumes that just weren't going to be recovering at a rate that we would expect. So -- but our operations are essential. We've maintained them. The hot idle costs are really associated with the production curtailment actions we're taking to manage inventories overall. Prith, maybe I'll turn it over to you talk about the impairment.

Prithvi Gandhi

Analyst

Yes. Thanks, Ken, for the question. So look, as we described in our 10-K in February, we had a small cushion between the fair value of our Insulation business and its carrying value of about 10% when we did our annual testing. At the time, we also indicated that any deterioration in the macroeconomic factors that influence Insulation could result in an increased likelihood of an impairment charge. And so what happened here in March with our market cap declining to a level below our book value, we had to do some interim testing. And there are 2 big changes. So we -- the impairment testing is based on a DCF methodology in terms of valuing the fair value of the business. And so there were 2 big changes in our parameters between our October test and the current testing in March. So first, because of the COVID-19 pandemic, financial market uncertainty has increased significantly, resulting in a much higher equity risk premium. So that really affected our discount rate that we used in October to the one we used in March by increasing it significantly. That -- and then the effect of the pandemic on near-term cash flows was the second big factor in changing our valuation. And those 2 things together really made the majority of the charge -- the impairment charges caused by those 2 factors.

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Thanks, Prith. I guess one item I'd just tack on to that, Ken, is when you look at goodwill in our Insulation business, if you look at where we ended 2019, it was about $1.5 billion of goodwill in Insulation. And about $900 million of that was actually associated with fresh start accounting that we had at emergence coming out of bankruptcy. So a large chunk tied to that. And at that time, that's when back '06 level, that was housing at 2 million starts and Insulation was generating the majority of the earnings. So just to put a little context around the size of the goodwill we were carrying in insulation and what were the key attributes of that.

Scott Cripps

Analyst

Elisa, I think we have time for one more question.

Operator

Operator

The last question today comes from Seldon Clarke of Deutsche Bank.

Seldon Clarke

Analyst

You talked about Roofing shipments being down 30% range in the second quarter. Could you just remind us how this typically trends in a slowdown? And I realize this is obviously an unprecedented situation. But could you just give us a sense around how you're thinking about the timing dynamics that might help us frame demand in the back half, just given the more resilient nature of the Roofing business? And if we saw an L-shape recovery or Nike shoes type recovery, would down 30% be the worst of it? Or how should we kind of think about that in the back half of the year?

Brian Chambers

Analyst

Yes. Thanks for the question. I would say this is a very unprecedented event, and I know that word has been overused, but normally in our Roofing business because it's a nondiscretionary replacement or repair. Even in recessionary cycles, in past recessionary cycles, you can go back, the demand trend for shingles has dropped a little bit because there's a little bit of discretionary work around new construction or remodeling activity, but the core kind of repair work stayed intact. I think the dramatic drop in the quarter is more around, this is a global health crisis, not a recessionary-driven event. So the shelter-in-place restrictions, I think, has just limited a contractors' ability to get to job sites, do the work. And candidly, I think homeowners have been pushing off having to make these projects materialize, so -- in terms of everybody sheltering in place. So I think it's a little bit of unprecedented in the dramatic kind of drop in demand in the quarter. And what we would expect coming back, as the shelter-in-place restrictions get lifted, again, it is a nondiscretionary repair, we expect that demand is going to return. We would expect that the performance of the business and the demand profile would return similar to other recessionary cycles, which it holds up very, very well. And Roofing is an outdoor construction activity. So that certainly helps in the current view in terms of how people are practicing good social distancing and wanting to make sure contractors are outside and doing the work there. So again, I think it's unusual to have this kind of demand drop. I think it's driven by the health crisis. But we would expect that demand would return in this business, and it would perform similar to past recessionary cycles.

Operator

Operator

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Scott Cripps for any closing remarks.

Scott Cripps

Analyst

Thank you, Elisa, and thanks, everyone, for joining today's call. With that, I'll turn it back over to Brian for a few closing remarks.

Brian Chambers

Analyst

All right. Thanks, Scott. And thanks, everyone, for your questions this morning. In closing, I'm incredibly proud of our team's strong execution and ability to deliver results in this dynamic environment. We have a clear focus on how we need to manage the business in the face of these challenging market conditions, and I'm highly confident in our team's ability to ensure our company emerges stronger than ever. So I want to thank you for your time this morning. We look forward to speaking to you again during the second quarter call. And until then, I hope you and your families remain healthy and safe. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.