Jan Bertsch
Analyst · Deutsche Bank
Sure. So Debbie, let me start with the bank credit agreement. We found an opportunity to renew that agreement a little bit prior to its maturity date of 2020, and the team took that opportunity. We found a very good capacity in the market, very good borrowing rates and also, as I mentioned, the terms and conditions have improved greatly. Across the board, on the pricing grid, we're seeing improvements in the borrowing rates that equate to about $5 million or so, on an annual basis. And so, we're very happy with the outcome of that renewal. On the pension – the legacy liabilities in general, I would say, I mentioned just briefly the pension plan this year. And we are going to continue to focus on our derisking efforts in that area. We're already into the details of the economics of that, and we hope to be able to annuitize another portion of our pension plans in the U.S., and even outside the U.S., we continue to look for opportunities. We have reduced our pension benefit obligations by about $1.8 billion in the last five years. I think in 2012, it was about $4.6 billion and now it's down to about $2.8 billion. So we want to continue on that momentum, and we're going to continue to look further at this. And while I'm talking about legacy liabilities I’d also like to talk for just a couple moments on asbestos. You will recall in July of 2016, following our restatement in May of that year, and the SEC initiated an investigation into certain accounting and control matters pertaining to the determination of our asbestos-related liabilities. And just recently, in May of this year, the SEC informed us that it had concluded its investigations. And based on the information that it had, it did not intend recommend an enforcement action against the company. So of course, we're very pleased with the results of that. And while we're on the general topic of asbestos, I just want to note that the asbestos litigation has involved now for 30 plus years and changes are pretty slow, and our disclosures over time have likewise evolved. And we added a bit more in our footnote and MD&A this quarter, as you will see when you review the 10-Q. We see O-I's pool of claimants shrinking and getting older and there could be some variability in how claims are presented, and ultimately, disposed of. And as you know, our annual asbestos payments have always been influenced by many factors and the long-term overall trend should remain pretty much the same. Although it's likely that we'll experience increased annual variability, and we may be also affected by opportunities to accelerate the disposition of certain discrete parts of the claimant pool, so you can read a little bit more about this in the 10-Q that will be filed this afternoon.