ABOUTWHIRLPOOL Whirlpool Corporation ("Whirlpool"), the world's leading kitchen and laundry appliance company, was incorporated in 1955 under the laws ofDelaware and was founded in 1911.Whirlpool manufactures products in 13 countries and markets products in nearly every country around the world. We have received worldwide recognition for accomplishments in a variety of business and social efforts, including leadership, diversity, innovative product design, business ethics, social responsibility and community involvement. We conduct our business through four operating segments, which we define based on geography.Whirlpool 's operating segments consist ofNorth America ,Europe ,Middle East andAfrica ("EMEA"),Latin America andAsia .Whirlpool had approximately$20 billion in annual sales and 77,000 employees in 2019. The world's leading kitchen and laundry appliance company claim is based on publicly reported annual product sales, parts, and support revenues for 2019. OVERVIEWWhirlpool had second-quarter GAAP net earnings available toWhirlpool of$35 million (net earnings margin of 0.9%), or$0.55 per share, compared to GAAP net earnings available toWhirlpool of$67 million (net earnings margin of 1.3%), or$1.04 per share, in the same prior-year period.Whirlpool delivered a resilient global performance with ongoing EBIT (non-GAAP) margin of 5.2%, compared to 7.0% in the same prior-year period, despite the significant impact of COVID-19 on global demand. The reduction in GAAP net earnings margin and ongoing EBIT margin were driven by continued COVID-19 disruptions, unfavorable product price/mix, the divestiture of the Embraco compressor business and unfavorable foreign currency. These results were partially offset by the favorable impacts of cost reduction initiatives. AsWhirlpool continues to assess the ongoing impact of COVID-19 on business results, we remain firmly committed to taking aggressive actions to address the health and safety of our employees and negative effects from demand disruptions and production impacts, including, but not limited to the following: • Executing business continuity actions focused on our employee health and safety, such as travel bans, remote work policies, line distancing in our factories and enhanced cleaning and hygiene in our facilities, among other measures. • Proactively taking actions to mitigate volume deleverage, including rapidly implementing cost reduction actions to reduce our cost footprint to provide additional operational flexibility during the crisis. • Implementing rapid liquidity preservation actions, reduction of supply flows into our manufacturing facilities, disciplined inventory management, and capital expenditure reductions. • Taking appropriate actions to provide incremental financial flexibility during the crisis and in these volatile financial markets. 33
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We believe that these aggressive cost reduction and liquidity preservation
actions serve to position
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