Michael Monahan
Analyst · Cross Research
Thank you, Murray. Our revenue for the quarter was $1.3 billion, a decline of 3% on a reported basis when compared with the prior year. Currency this quarter was a 2% benefit to revenue. As Murray noted, revenue was adversely impacted this quarter by heightened economic concerns among many of our customers especially some of our larger customers who have delayed making capital investment commitments. Breaking down our revenue for the quarter between U.S. and non-U.S. operations, U.S. revenue declined by about 6%. Outside the U.S., revenue on a reported basis increased 3% versus the prior year, while excluding the impact of currency, revenue declined 4%. Non-U.S. operations represented 31% of our total revenue. Let me give you a quick update on the status of our recovery from the fire last February at our Dallas presort facility. As I stated last quarter, a new site was quickly identified after the fire and outfitted with state-of-the-art equipment. Less than 5 months after the fire at the end of June, the new permanent facility opened its doors. In August, the new facility achieved operational efficiency comparable to the original Dallas site. We have continued to work closely with our insurance carriers to resolve our claims related to the fire. During the quarter, we received from the insurance carriers additional reimbursements related to the fire that included compensation for the lost earnings, we experienced in the first 2 quarters of the year which were about $15 million or $0.05 per share. Accounting rules are such they were unable to offset the estimated $19 million in lost revenue we experienced with any of the insurance proceeds. We expect to finalize our remaining claims with the insurance carriers shortly. Turning to adjusted earnings before interest and taxes or EBIT for the quarter, it was $235 million, which was 3% higher than last year. EBIT margin was 18.1%, an increase of 120 basis points versus the prior year. EBIT margin was helped by the insurance reimbursement we received this quarter, but was adversely affected by our planned investment in Volly, which was about $4 million during the quarter. Excluding the impact of these 2 items, the EBIT margin this quarter would have been about 17%, which is an improvement versus last year. SG&A in the quarter declined about $5 million when compared with the prior year. Excluding the effects of currency, SG&A declined by almost $16 million. SG&A benefited from our ongoing productivity initiatives. EBIT margins this quarter improved year-over-year in 4 of our 7 business segments. Both our SMB segments improved this year their year-over-year EBIT margins for the third consecutive quarter. Our Software and Mail Services businesses also had improving EBIT margins this quarter. These improvements are primarily a result of continued focus on increasing our operating efficiency across all of our businesses. Excluding the net insurance reimbursements, the Mail Services EBIT margin improved year-over-year due to the leverage of higher mail volumes processed and greater presort network efficiencies. We continue to reap the benefits of the Strategic Transformation actions we have taken since the second half of 2009. We're implementing actions that are enabling us to improve the way we go to market, interact with our customers and develop new products. We continue to put in place new processes and systems that will make our operations more streamlined and our cost more variable, allowing us to improve profitability by better leveraging future revenue growth. When we add back depreciation and amortization to our adjusted EBIT, adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $302 million or $1.49 per share. Net interest expense in the quarter, including financing interest was $49 million, a modest decrease of $2 million when compared with the prior year. The average interest rate for the quarter was 4.63%. It was 19 basis points higher than the prior year due to the changes in the debt portfolio mix. The effective tax rate for the quarter on adjusted earnings was 22.4% versus 33.1% last year. The lower tax rate this year was primarily the result of our settlement with the IRS related to tax years 2001 through 2004. As a result, during the quarter, we realized an income tax benefit of about $16 million in continuing operations. Excluding the impact of the tax settlement, our tax rate on adjusted earnings from continuing operations would have been 31.2% for the quarter. We actually had a GAAP tax benefit for the quarter in part because of the IRS tax settlement I just noted and in part because of the tax benefit we received from the sale of the leveraged leased asset in Canada. Excluding the benefits of these 2 items, GAAP tax rate this quarter would have been 31%. Adjusted earnings per diluted share from continuing operations for the quarter was $0.69 compared with $0.55 for the same period last year. Our adjusted earnings per diluted share this quarter included a $0.05 benefit from net insurance proceeds received during the quarter related to the Dallas presort facility fire. This $0.05 net benefit offsets the fire related losses we experienced in the first 2 quarters of the year. Adjusted earnings per diluted share also benefited from the IRS tax settlement as I discussed earlier, which equaled $0.08. However, adjusted earnings per share -- diluted share were reduced this quarter by additional plan investment in Volly, which was about $0.01. Last year, third quarter adjusted earnings per diluted share were $0.55, which included a $0.03 favorable adjustment related to a leverage leased portfolio in Canada. Put the year-over-year comparison of adjusted earnings per diluted share in perspective, if you back out the $0.13 of benefits we received this quarter, we would have earned $0.56. This compares with $0.52 last year, excluding the $0.03 benefit in that period. This represents an 8% increase in adjusted earnings per diluted share. GAAP earnings per diluted share for the quarter increased almost 100% over the prior year to $0.85. There are a number of unusual items impacting GAAP earnings this quarter, including restructuring charges and asset impairments that totaled $0.11. Asset impairments included charges related to our Strategic Transformation program of $0.03 for the planned exit of our Harlow, U.K. facility. In addition, there was an impairment of intangible assets associated with our International Mail Services operations of $0.04 per share. GAAP earnings per diluted share also included a $0.15 impairment charge to goodwill related to International Mail Services, due to a change in expectations for the future growth of this business. Additionally, GAAP earnings per diluted share for the quarter included a net benefit of $0.13 related to the sale of leveraged leased asset in Canada and a $0.30 benefit in discontinued operations due to the tax settlement with the IRS as I discussed previously. Free cash flow was $260 million for the quarter in comparison to the prior year, free cash flow for the quarter benefited from the release of tax bonds related to the IRS tax settlement, as well as from the timing of tax payments. Because of the effects of Hurricane Irene last quarter, the IRS allowed companies to defer tax payments normally due in the third quarter to the fourth quarter. Therefore, in the fourth quarter, we will be making both our third quarter and fourth quarter tax payments. Cash flow also benefited from higher net income, as well as lower finance receivables. However, the benefit from finance receivables this quarter was about 1/3 less than the prior year. During the quarter, we returned $75 million of cash to our shareholders in the form of dividends. We also repurchased 2.6 million shares of Pitney Bowes common stock for about $50 million. We have $50 million of share repurchase authorization remaining, which we expect to use over the next 3 to 9 months. As of the end of the quarter, we had no commercial paper outstanding. We have no debt coming due until October 2012. About 76% of our total debt is fixed rate and 24% is floating rate. Now let me update you on our Strategic Transformation program. In the third quarter, we continued to implement initiatives identified by our project team. During the third quarter, the pretax restructuring and asset impairment charges related to our Strategic Transformation program were approximately $21 million. $11 million of those charges were for severance and other exit costs associated with the elimination of about 400 positions across the company. This brings the total number of positions eliminated since the beginning of the program to 3,800. As I noted earlier, we also had an asset impairment charge of $10 million during the quarter for the pending exit of our Harlow, U.K. facility and the move to a smaller, more cost-efficient building. Based on our expenditures to date, we still expect total charges for the year related to the Strategic Transformation program, will be in the range of $0.25 to $0.35 per share. We continue to target a run rate of annualized net benefits for the full program in the range of $250 million to $300 million by the end of 2011. So that concludes my remarks. Now, Murray will discuss our guidance and will have some closing comments.