Prompt:
Human: For those of you that have not, it is available on the Investor Relations section of our website at investor.
I'm pleased to report another quarter of strong operating performance and continued positive momentum at the Aaron's Company.
In the nearly one year since our separation, we have significantly strengthened our leadership position in the direct-to-consumer lease end market and are tracking well ahead of our long-term strategic plan.
Continued investments in our best-in-class e-commerce channel, predictive lease decisioning engine and our high performing GenNext stores are driving greater productivity and growth in our business.
Through the tremendous efforts of our team, we continue to transform Aaron's go-to-market strategy by delivering customer friendly digital solutions, easy lease approvals and an enhanced shopping experience.
Since 1955, Aaron's has been committed to serving a customer base that has too often been overlooked or excluded from preferred retail experiences.
Today, we are leveraging our long and deep understanding of this customer segment to say yes when others say no; to provide our customers with access to great products on flexible and affordable terms and to deliver a seamless customer experience not only across our distributed store network but also digitally through our award winning e-commerce platform.
Whether our customers interact with us in one of our beautiful new GenNext stores or via their mobile device, we continue to provide a growing assortment of products they want and need with low monthly payments that fit their budget and best-in-class customer service.
I'm pleased to announce that our third quarter 2021 results have again exceeded our expectations through continued growth in the size of our lease portfolio same-store revenues and e-commerce revenues.
As a result, we returned another $37.5 million to shareholders in the quarter in the form of share repurchases.
This brings us to a total of nearly $100 million of capital returned to shareholders thus far this year.
The strong third quarter results, we are again raising our revenue and earnings outlook for the full year 2021.
In the third quarter, same-store revenues grew 4.6% compared to the prior year, the sixth consecutive quarter of positive same-store revenue growth.
The improvement was primarily driven by an 8.7% larger lease portfolio size entering the third quarter partially offset by a lower level of customer payment activity compared to the prior year.
Our same-store lease portfolio size continues to grow at a healthy pace ending the third quarter up 6.1% compared to the prior year.
We attribute this growth primarily to strong demand for our products, higher average ticket, the favorable impact of centralized lease decisioning and the residual impact of government stimulus on the portfolio.
As discussed previously, our predictive lease decisioning engine is working very well and enables us to better match the customers' lease payment with their financial position with the goal of helping more customers achieve ownership and lowering our overall cost to serve.
In addition, our lease decisioning algorithms allow us to be flexible in responding to changes in the macroeconomic environment and to optimize outcomes that drive profitability.
As of the end of the third quarter, more than 83% of our total lease portfolio is comprised of lease agreements that were originated through our centralized decisioning platforms.
This compares to approximately 60% at the beginning of 2021.
As I mentioned last quarter, lease payment activity in 2021 has exceeded historical levels due to the government stimulus provided to our customer leading to higher lease renewal rates and lower write-offs as we saw in the third quarter and expect to see over the next three to four quarters, customer payment activity continues to normalize.
Because of investments we've made in centralized decisioning and lease servicing technologies, we expect 2022 lease renewal rates to ultimately settle above pre-pandemic levels but below the level we expect for the full year 2021.
We also expect lease merchandise write-offs in 2022 to settle below pre-pandemic levels but above the level we expect for full year 2021.
In addition to investments in our decisioning technology, we also continue to invest in our e-commerce channel and our GenNext strategy.
Our e-commerce channel continues to grow at double-digit rates representing 14.3% of total lease revenues in the quarter.
The growth in our portfolio of leases generated online is driving improvements to our overall margin performance as we leverage the fixed cost structure of our store and supply chain assets to serve customers that are seeking a virtual shopping experience, low monthly payments and free delivery.
Ongoing investments in digital marketing and our customers' online experience are driving growth in this important channel, specifically e-commerce investments are leading to an enhanced shopping experience driven by personalization and richer product content improved customer visibility into products that are available for same or next day delivery and a broader assortment that includes new product categories.
Today we have more than 3,000 products on aaron's.com, which is double from a year ago.
And our express delivery program accounts for approximately 30% of e-commerce volume.
Because of this, we're generating a higher customer conversion rate, lowering our effective acquisition costs and delivering higher customer satisfaction.
I could not be happier with the efforts of our team and the growing marketplace we're creating on aaron's.com.
As we discussed last quarter, our GenNext stores continue to perform at a high level.
During the third quarter, we increased the size of our GenNext store set by 22 to end the quarter with 86 locations.
And we believe we remain on track to have more than 100 GenNext stores by the end of the year.
To date, our portfolio of GenNext stores is generating results that are exceeding our targeted 25% internal rate of return and 5-year payback period.
Equally as encouraging, monthly lease originations in GenNext stores open for less than one year again grew at a rate of more than 20 percentage points higher than our average legacy stores.
Stores, we continue to maintain a disciplined approach around our execution of the strategy.
Our merchandising and supply chain teams have performed exceptionally well by getting ahead of market disruptions, by procuring inventory and expanding output from our Woodhaven manufacturing facilities.
As a result, we are entering the holiday season with strong inventory levels in both our stores and distribution centers and we have been increasing prices to respond to inflationary pressures and maintain product margins.
I remain encouraged by the underlying performance of both our store and e-commerce channels as we're tracking well ahead of our 5-year plan on revenue and earnings.
For the third quarter of 2021, total revenues were $452.2 million compared with $441 million for the third quarter of 2020, an increase of 2.5%.
The increase in revenues was primarily due to the increased size of our lease portfolio, partially offset by the expected lower customer payment activity during the quarter and the reduction of 79 franchise stores during the 15-month period ended September 30, 2021.
Lease revenues in the third quarter of this year also benefited by an increase in ticket size or monthly rent for agreement, that is offsetting the inflation we are experiencing in the cost of lease merchandise.
On a same-store basis, lease and retail revenues increased 4.6% in the third quarter compared to the prior year quarter.
As Douglas mentioned, this is our sixth consecutive positive quarter of same-store revenue growth.
Leases originated in both our e-commerce and in-store channels contributed to our revenue growth, which was primarily driven by a larger same-store lease portfolio size, partially offset by the expected lower customer payment activity in the quarter.
More specifically, in the third quarter of this year, our customer lease renewal rate was 89.7%, which was approximately 230 basis points higher than the 3-year third quarter pre-pandemic average but was approximately 130 basis points lower than the third quarter of last year.
For any period, the customer lease renewal rate is calculated by dividing the amount of customer payments recorded on an accrual basis as of the end of such period by the amount of total customer lease payments due for renewal during that period.
As discussed on our last earnings call, the benefits to our customer from government stimulus programs declined in the third quarter and as expected, resulted in lower customer payment activity as compared to the prior year.
We expect customer payment activity to continue to decline year-over-year for the next three or four quarters.
And I will point out that a 100 basis point change up or down in customer lease renewal rates or write-offs on a $1.6 billion annual portfolio of total collectible customer lease payments results in a $16 million change in EBITDA.
Additionally, we continue to expect that customer payment activity will benefit from our investments in centralized decisioning.
We estimate that this technology has improved lease renewal rates by over 100 basis points compared to the pre-pandemic levels, while also materially improving the customer experience and simplifying the day-to-day activities at our stores.
E-commerce revenues increased 13.3% versus the third quarter of 2020 and represented 14.3% of overall lease revenues compared to 13.1% in the third quarter of the prior year.
We continue to make investments in this important channel that we believe will continue to drive long-term growth for the company.
The company ended the third quarter of 2021 with a lease portfolio size for all company-operated stores of $132.2 million, an increase of 5.8% compared to a lease portfolio size of $125 million on September 30 of last year.
As a reminder, lease portfolio size represents the next month's total collectible lease payments from our aggregate outstanding customer lease agreements.
Management believes this is one of the metrics that is important in understanding the drivers of future lease revenue.
Total operating expenses, excluding restructuring expenses and spin-related costs were up $15.7 million in the quarter as compared to the third quarter of last year.
This increase is due primarily to higher personnel costs and a higher provision for lease merchandise write-offs.
Personnel costs increased $5.1 million in the third quarter of 2021 as compared to the prior year, primarily due to higher wages in our stores, additional personnel to support our key strategic initiatives and higher stand-alone public company costs.
Additionally, personnel costs were lower-than-anticipated during the third quarter this year as staffing levels in our stores remain below our operational targets due to the current challenges in the US labor market for retail-based hourly employees.
Other operating expenses were relatively flat to the prior year period due to higher occupancy, shipping and handling costs, professional services and bank and credit card-related fees.
These increases were partially offset by lower advertising costs in the third quarter of 2021 versus the prior year period.
The provision for lease merchandise write-offs as a percentage of lease revenues and fees was 4.9% for the three months ended September 30, 2021, compared to an all-time low of 2.4% in the comparable period in 2020.
The increase in write-offs in the third quarter of this year compared to last year was primarily due to lower customer payment activity following several quarters where our customers received financial assistance in the form of government stimulus payments and supplemental federal unemployment benefits.
This normalization in write-offs was partially offset by the continued favorable impact of our technology investments, which include decisioning algorithms and customer payment platforms as well as our team's strong operational execution.
As we discussed on prior earnings calls, we continue to expect that annual write-offs will be between 4% to 5% of lease revenues and fees.
Adjusted EBITDA for the company was $53.6 million for the third quarter of 2021 compared with $64.3 million for the same period in 2020, a decrease of $10.7 million or 16.6%.
As a percentage of revenues, adjusted EBITDA margin was 11.9% in the third quarter of 2021 compared to 14.6% for the same period in 2020.
This expected decline in adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin was due to lower customer payment activity, higher lease merchandise write-offs and higher personnel costs compared to the prior year levels.
On a non-GAAP basis, diluted earnings per share were $0.83 in the third quarter of 2021 compared with non-GAAP diluted earnings per share of $1.10 for the same quarter in 2020.
Cash generated from operating activities was $30.2 million for the third quarter of 2021, a decline of $92.6 million compared to the third quarter of 2020.
This decline was primarily due to incremental purchases of lease merchandise to meet increased customer demand and to mitigate the impact of anticipated supply chain challenges ahead of the upcoming holiday season.
In addition, the cost of our lease merchandise was adversely impacted by inflationary pressure.
During the third quarter, the company purchased approximately 1,333,000 shares of Aaron's common stock for a total purchase price of approximately $37.5 million and through a 10b5-1 plan continue to repurchase shares into the first month of the current quarter.
For the year-to-date period ended October 22, 2021, the company has repurchased 3,034,000 shares for approximately $90.4 million.
As of October 22, we had approximately $60 million remaining under the company's $150 million share repurchase program that was approved by our Board in March of this year and ends December 31, 2023.
Additionally, the company's Board of Directors declared a regular quarterly cash dividend in August of $0.10 per share, which was paid on October 5.
As of September 30, 2021, the company had a cash balance of $15 million, no outstanding debt and total available liquidity of $248 million, which includes $233 million available under our unsecured revolving credit facility.
As Douglas highlighted in his remarks, we have again raised our full year revenue and adjusted EBITDA outlook for 2021.
For the full year, we have increased our outlook for total revenues to between $1.82 billion and $1.83 billion.
We also increased our outlook for adjusted EBITDA to between $225 million and $230 million.
For the full year 2021, we have maintained our outlook for an effective tax rate of 26%; we expect depreciation and amortization of approximately $70 million, and we expect the diluted weighted average share count for full year 2021 to be 34 million shares.
We have not assumed any additional shares repurchased beyond what has been discussed earlier on the call.
We have also increased our full year same-store revenues outlook from a range of 6% to 8% to a range of 7.5% to 8.5%.
This increase is primarily a result of the continued year-over-year growth in our lease portfolio size.
We have maintained our expected capital expenditure range of $90 million to $100 million.
We have reduced our free cash flow outlook for 2021 to $30 million to $40 million, primarily to reflect the significant investment in lease merchandise inventory the company has made to mitigate the impact of global supply chain challenges and the related inflationary pressures.
Based on our current inventory levels, we do not anticipate any material challenges in meeting our customers' product demand as we end 2021 and head into 2022.
As I have previously described, benefits to our customer from government stimulus programs have moderated in the third quarter.
Our revised outlook continues to assume customer lease payment activity remains higher in the fourth quarter of 2021 when compared to pre COVID-19 pandemic levels, but lower than the fourth quarter of 2020.
At the same time, we believe the favorable impact of centralized lease decisioning, our digital servicing platforms and other operational enhancements are contributing to a sustainable improvement in customer payment and write-off activity.
Additionally, we expect write-offs will continue to be lower in the fourth quarter of 2021 when compared to pre COVID-19 pandemic levels but higher than the fourth quarter of 2020.
Finally, our updated outlook assumes no significant deterioration in the current retail environment, state of the US economy or global supply chain as compared to their current conditions.
 Assistant:

Chosen response:
compname reports q3 non-gaap earnings per share $0.83.
q3 non-gaap earnings per share $0.83.
q3 revenue rose 2.5 percent to $452.2 million.
sees fy revenue $1.82 billion to $1.83 billion.
increased our expected 2021 adjusted ebitda to between $225 million and $230 million.
lowered our 2021 annual free cash flow outlook to between $30 million and $40 million.


Prompt:
Human: For those of you that have not, it is available on the Investor Relations section of our website at investor.
Actual results in the future may be materially different than those discussed here.
This could be due to a variety of factors including, among other things, uncertainties associated with the duration and severity of the COVID-19 pandemic and related impact on the economy and supply chain.
The company believes that these non-GAAP financial measures provide meaningful insight into the company's operational performance and cash flows, and provides these measures to investors to help facilitate comparisons of operating results with prior periods and to assist them in understanding the company's ongoing operational performance.
For the month of December, 2020, our results represent the consolidated statements of the company and its subsidiaries, and is based on the financial position and results of operations as a stand-alone company.
For all periods prior to December 1st 2020, combined financial statements include all revenue and cost directly attributable to the company and an allocation of expenses from our former parent related to certain corporate functions and actions.
First, let me take a moment to recognize all of our talented team members for their determination and commitment in 2020, which enabled Aaron's to accelerate our key strategic priorities in a very challenging year.
Our fantastic team members at our stores, distribution and service centers, Woodhaven manufacturing and store support center worked tirelessly to provide products and services to our customers, while accelerating our digital and real estate transformation.
We overcame the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, while continuing to meet the needs of our customers and safeguarding our team members.
At the same time, we delivered annual revenues that exceeded our expectations for the year and an adjusted EBITDA that was higher than we've generated in several years.
In addition, during the year, our team has worked diligently to establish Aaron's as a new stand-alone publicly traded company.
The spin-off transaction closed on November 30th 2020.
And following the spin, we are well positioned with a strong balance sheet and cash flow profile to execute on our go-forward strategy.
While some uncertainty remains regarding how the Corona virus may impact the economy or consumer behavior, I'm more energized and optimistic about our future than ever.
Our business has never been more nimble, and we continue to make investments in technology, decisioning, e-commerce and store operations that are yielding higher productivity and lease portfolio performance.
In the fourth quarter of 2020, same-store revenues rose 3.4% as compared to the prior year quarter, primarily due to strong customer payment activity, improving lease portfolio size and higher retail sales.
The fourth quarter was the sixth out of the last eight quarters with positive same-store comps, with 2020 representing the first annual positive same-store revenue growth since 2013.
Additionally, we ended 2020 with a larger and healthier lease portfolio than we had at the beginning of the year.
The larger portfolio size is a result of better collections, fewer product returns and lower write-offs, which was enabled by improvements in operational execution, the roll-out of centralized decisioning technology and enhancements to our customer payments platform.
We achieved this larger portfolio despite revenue written into the portfolio that was flat in the fourth quarter.
Recall that our implementation of decisioning technology in the second quarter of 2020 effectively reduced new lease originations and therefore, revenue written by 6% to 8%.
Moving to our e-commerce channel.
Revenues grew 39% in the quarter and represented approximately 13% of total lease revenues compared to 10% in the fourth quarter of 2019.
In the fourth quarter, e-commerce traffic was up 29% compared to the fourth quarter of 2019.
Despite the significant increase in traffic at aarons.com, e-commerce recurring revenue written into the portfolio declined 1.2% as compared to last year's fourth quarter, due to both decisioning optimization and lower conversion of traffic.
Conversion is not what we would expect it to be due to the inventory shortages resulting from the global supply chain disruption.
However, our inventory position continues to modestly improve in the first quarter of 2021, which should lead to higher conversion rates.
I'm encouraged by the progress of our e-commerce initiatives, including our evolving analytics and digital capabilities.
Improvements in online customer acquisition, conversion and decisioning are leading to margin growth and continued positive momentum in this important channel.
In 2020, we also accelerated our strategy to consolidate, remodel and reposition our store footprint with our new GenNext store concept, which includes enhanced shared rooms, digital technologies, expanded product assortment and improved brand imaging.
As of the end of the year, we had 47 GenNext stores opened and have more than 60 additional stores in the 2021 pipeline.
Our GenNext stores are performing well, delivering new lease volumes that are higher than the corporate averages and in line with our expectations.
While the new stores still represent a small portion of our overall store count, we believe over time the execution of our GenNext store strategy will provide meaningful lift to our overall performance.
Overall, I'm pleased with our full year of 2020 and fourth quarter results.
And I'm encouraged about the future and our new chapter as a financially strong stand-alone public company.
As we look to 2021, we remain focused on our key strategic initiatives of simplifying and digitizing the customer experience, aligning our store footprint to our customer opportunity and promoting the Aaron's value proposition of low payments, high approval rates and best-in-class service.
For the full year 2020, consolidated revenues were $1.735 billion, a decline of 2.8% compared to the full year 2019.
This decline is primarily the result of a reduction of 253 company-operated stores in 2019 and 2020 partially offset by a 1.8% increase in same-store revenues for the year.
Adjusted EBITDA for the full year 2020 was $208.9 million, an increase of $43.6 million or 26.4% compared to the full year of 2019.
As a percentage of revenues, adjusted EBITDA was 12% compared to 9.3%, an increase of 270 basis points over the prior year.
This increase in adjusted EBITDA is primarily due to an improvement in customer payment activity, fewer lease merchandise returns and efficiencies in store operations, including pandemic-related staffing reductions in the second and third quarters of 2020.
Write-offs were 4.2% of lease revenues in 2020, a 200 basis point improvement over 2019.
Annual non-GAAP earnings per share was $3.02 in 2020, an increase of 43.8% compared to $2.10 for prior year 2019.
Turning to the fourth quarter of 2020.
Revenues were $430 million, a decrease of approximately 1% compared to the same quarter last year, despite the closure, consolidation and acquisition of a net 75 company-owned locations throughout the year.
Adjusted EBITDA was $53.7 million for the fourth quarter compared to $51.2 million for the same period of 2019, an increase of $2.5 million or 4.8%.
Adjusted EBITDA margin was 12.5% of revenues compared to 11.8% in the same period a year ago, an increase of 70 basis points.
The improvement in Q4 2020 adjusted EBITDA margin was primarily due to the reduction in inventory write-offs, partially offset by comping over the impact of one-time benefits realized in the fourth quarter of the prior year period.
These one-time items in 2019, related primarily to gains from real estate sale and leaseback transactions and other miscellaneous items.
Excluding these one-time items from 2019, adjusted EBITDA margin in the fourth quarter of 2020 would have improved approximately 250 basis points.
Diluted earnings per share on a non-GAAP basis for the quarter increased 11.3% to $0.79 versus $0.71 in the prior year quarter, primarily due to the continuing strength of customer payment activity and reduced lease merchandise write-offs.
Operating expenses were down $1.2 million as compared to the fourth quarter of 2019, primarily due to an $11.7 million reduction in write-offs, offset primarily by an increase in advertising spend and the previously mentioned benefit of real estate transactions that took place in the fourth quarter of the prior year.
During the fourth quarter of 2020, the company's store labor expense increased compared to the second and third quarters, during which labor expenses were lower due to pandemic-related store closures and furloughs.
Write-offs in the fourth quarter were 4.3%, down 300 basis points from the prior year fourth quarter, due primarily to the implementation of our new decisioning technology, improved operations and the benefit of government stimulus.
Cash generated from operating activities was $355.8 million for the 12 months ended December 31, 2020.
Cash from operating activities grew $169.8 million year-over-year, primarily due to improved lease portfolio performance, lower inventory purchases and one-time tax benefits resulting from the CARES Act, partially offset by other changes in working capital.
At the end of the year, the company had a cash balance of $76.1 million and less than $1 million of debt.
In addition, concurrent with completing the spin-off transaction of November 30th, the company entered into a $250 million unsecured revolving credit facility, which was undrawn at the end of 2020, giving the company more than $300 million of liquidity as of year-end.
Before I review our outlook for 2021, I want to remind you all that in November, prior to completing the spin-off transaction, the legacy combined company accelerated the payment of its regular quarterly cash dividend, which would normally have been paid in January 2021.
Turning to our 2021 outlook.
We currently expect total revenues in the range of $1.65 billion to $1.7 billion.
Adjusted EBITDA is expected to be in the range of $155 million to $170 million, representing an increase in the midpoint of our outlook as compared to the preliminary outlook we provided in November.
As it relates to the seasonality of our financial results, we expect that both revenues and earnings will be somewhat higher in the first six months of 2021 compared to the second six months of 2021.
Free cash flows, which we define as operating cash flows of less capital expenditures, are expected to be $80 million to $90 million.
Capital expenditures are also expected to be between $80 million and $90 million for the year.
This outlook assumes a few key items we want to highlight.
First, no significant deterioration in the current retail environment or in the state of the U.S. economy as compared to its current condition.
Second, a gradual improvement in global supply chain conditions.
And finally, no incremental government stimulus or supplemental unemployment benefits.
To summarize, 2020 was a successful year for Aaron's, despite the many challenges our team members and customers faced.
To echo Douglas's earlier comments, I am encouraged by the opportunity ahead of us.
The unique nature of Aaron's recurring revenue business model combined with our strong balance sheet, cash flows and operating leverage enables us to perform well during this period of uncertainty.
 Assistant:

Chosen response:
q4 non-gaap earnings per share $0.79.
sees fy revenue $1.65 billion to $1.7 billion.
sees fy 2021 adjusted ebitda of between $155 million and $170 million.


Prompt:
Human: I am joined by Tom Greco, our President and Chief Executive Officer; and Jeff Shepherd, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.
I hope you and your families are healthy and safe amid all that we've endured over the past 12 months.
Here at Advance, we are incredibly grateful for the way our entire team persevere.
When the reality of COVID-19 defended on our communities in March of 2020, we found ways across AAP to meet new unfamiliar challenges with innovation and agility.
As an essential business, their efforts have been critical to keep America moving during a time of great needs.
As you've heard from us throughout this pandemic, we remain focused on three overarching priorities.
First, protect the health, safety and well being of our team members and customers.
Second, preserve cash and protect the P&L during the crisis.
And third, prepare to be even stronger following the crisis.
Our results in Q4 and for the full year demonstrate that our unwavering focus on these priorities has enabled meaningful progress toward our long-term goals.
From the beginning, we've invested in compensation for our frontline and distribution center team members, enhanced benefits, cleaning, personal protective equipment and innovative ways to serve our customers.
This helped ensure that our team members and customers feel safe coming into work and to shop.
Our store and distribution center team members continuously stepped up throughout the year, and they are the true heroes for us.
In spite of many obstacles for our team, we saw significant improvements in organizational health and increased engagement scores throughout the year.
Fundamentally, we are building trust in the Advance brand at an enduring time for the world and one that our team members and customers will always remember.
We're confident our COVID-19-related investments, which we believe will subside over time, are strengthening our employment brand, our customer brand and our corporate reputation for the long-term.
In Q4, we delivered comparable store sales growth of 4.7% and margin expansion of 17 basis points.
This includes an 82 basis point headwind related to COVID-19.
Adjusted diluted earnings per share improvement of 14% to $1.87, including a $0.22 headwind related to COVID-19.
For the full year, we delivered top-line growth resulting in record net sales of $10.1 billion.
Adjusted operating income improvement of 4.1% to $827.3 million, including a $60 million headwind related to COVID-19.
Record adjusted diluted earnings per share of $8.51, including a $0.66 headwind related to COVID-19.
And we also returned $515 million to shareholders through share repurchases and our continued quarterly cash dividend.
Jeff will cover more on the details of our financials shortly, but first, let's review our operational performance.
COVID-19-related factors continued to affect channel performance in Q4 across our industry.
DIY omnichannel led the way, as it has since Q2.
It's well documented that consumers are spending more of their time at home, likely contributing to the shift in discretionary spending from services to goods.
Given economic uncertainty and elevated unemployment, many consumers are choosing lower cost options for vehicle repairs and maintenance, benefiting our DIY omnichannel business.
Our professional business continued to recover with positive comp sales in both Q3 and Q4.
Miles driven remained below prior year, in particular, for higher income workers working remotely who generally take their cars to pro shops.
This has limited growth in certain professional sales channels and in key categories like brakes.
Geographically, all of our eight regions posted positive comps in the quarter, led by our southernmost regions, including both the Southeast and Southwest.
Meanwhile, our Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions remained below our reported growth rate.
As previously discussed, large urban markets in these regions have been more impacted by COVID-19 with the most significant decline in miles driven.
The good news is that while there remains a gap between our highest and lowest performing regions that spread continues to narrow.
We're cautiously optimistic this will further narrow in Q1 based on improving trends and more favorable winter weather early in the year.
With respect to categories, DieHard is driving record battery sales and led our growth in Q4.
In addition, appearance chemicals remained strong, a trend that began with the stay at home orders last April.
Across our professional business, our team continues to leverage our industry-leading assortment of national brands, OE parts and own brands.
For pro customers, there is nothing more important than having the right part in the right place at the right time.
To enable this, we continued to strengthen our Dynamic Assortment tool, which is now live in all our corporate stores and more than 700 independent locations that have opted in.
This machine learning platform has enabled significant improvements in product availability, helping drive over 60 basis point improvement in Q4 close rates.
In addition, we continued to make enhancements to our online portal, MyAdvance.
The ease of access and wide array of resources available now includes features like virtual training, which has been essential during the pandemic.
The resources we provide through our Carquest and WorldPac technical institutes allow our pro customers, including all technicians within those shop to attend interactive virtual training.
Additionally, we continue to update our comprehensive catalog of technical service bulletins through our MotoLogic platform.
We believe pro customers are recognizing and appreciating our investments to improve parts quality, product availability, delivery speed and the digital experience, resulting in higher enterprise pro online sales and share of wallet.
These actions have also enabled growth of our Technet customer base with approximately 1,400 new Technets added in 2020.
Finally, we continued increasing our Carquest Independent locations in 2020, welcoming 50 new stores.
Our independents remain a valuable component of our overall strategy and our team remains focused on further expansion.
Moving on to DIY omnichannel, we gained share in every region and across most categories in both Q4 and for the full year based on the syndicated data available to us.
We believe our share gains are the result of our focus in four areas.
First, the launch of DieHard.
Second, building awareness in regard of Advance through differentiation.
Third, improving customer loyalty through Speed Perks.
And fourth, improving store execution.
Starting with DieHard, despite the challenges of the pandemic, our team successfully launched DieHard as planned and executed a marketing plan unlike anything we've ever done before at AAP.
Our DieHard is Back campaign, featuring Bruce Willis, let consumers know that the iconic DieHard brand was back and they can now buy DieHard at Advance and Carquest.
This campaign is already improving top of mind and unaided awareness for DieHard.
Our Speed Perks program is an important tool to drive customer loyalty.
Our team continues to invest in personalization for Speed Perks members, driving higher engagement, long-term loyalty and increased share of wallet.
In 2020, we grew our VIP members, those with an annual spend of $250 to $500 by nearly 15%.
And our Elite members, those with annual spend of more than $500 by more than 20%.
To wrap up the discussion on DIY omnichannel, we continue to see improvement from our initiatives, including our net promoter scores.
This gives us confidence that we're on the right track to sustained sales and share momentum in 2021.
Moving on to an update of our four pillars of margin expansion, I'll begin with sales and profit per store.
As a reminder, following three consecutive years of declining sales per store, we finished 2017 at approximately $1.5 million per store.
Over the last three years, we've been optimizing our footprint, including the closure of 273 underperforming stores.
Our sales per store have now grown for three consecutive years.
And we finished 2020 at nearly $1.7 million per store.
We're also executing a focused agenda to leverage payroll, while reducing shrink, returns and the factors to drive four wall profit per store improvement.
In addition, the ongoing focus on team members is enabling us to attract the very best parts people and to reduce turnover.
Our team members are a differentiator for Advance.
And four years ago, we made a commitment to dramatically improve retention.
Continued investment in our unique Fuel the Frontline program with more than 22,000 stock grants awarded since inception is creating an ownership culture.
In the current environment, with an increased competition for talent, we are reducing store turnover and enhancing our employment brand.
We now have three straight years of comp sales growth and the closure of underperforming stores behind us.
We're excited to announce that we plan to expand our store base and geographic footprint this year and expect to open 50 to 100 new stores.
Our second margin expansion pillar is supply chain.
While we paused our cross banner replenishment and warehouse management system initiatives early in 2020, our team found ways to innovate and make progress on these productivity opportunity later in the year.
The expansion of cross banner replenishment is on track with the timing we communicated in November.
As we finished the year with just over 40% of the originally planned stores completed, we are on track to complete the originally planned stores and DCs by the end of Q3 2021 and the full run rate savings will come beginning in Q4 2021.
In addition, the implementation of our new warehouse management system or WMS continued in Q4.
We converted our fourth DC by year end as planned and we're on track to complete our largest buildings this year.
We believe we can capture roughly 75% of the savings from this initiative in 2022.
Moving on to category management, the expansion of our own brand assortment is a key component.
This includes an increase of Carquest-branded assortment in engine management and undercar.
Carquest has an excellent reputation with installers and new products have been very well received by both pro customers and Carquest Independents.
In 2020, we also launched our strategic pricing initiative to enhance our capabilities, while incorporating customer decision journey insights into price and discount decision making.
Finally, our fourth pillar of margin expansion involves reducing and better leveraging SG&A.
The successful execution of our field restructure, back office consolidations and safety initiatives benefited SG&A in the quarter and will enable further improvement in margin expansion going forward.
As we called out in November, SG&A was elevated in Q4, primarily due to COVID-19-related expenses and other factors that Jeff will detail shortly.
To summarize, we're now in execution mode on our key growth and margin expansion initiatives.
Our mission is Passion for Customers Passion for Yes.
With the goal of serving them with care and speed, we've made many necessary changes at AAP in recent years.
But one thing that has not changed is the current technology, the passion and the commitment of our team members and independent partners.
Our actions have strengthened Advance, enabling us to compete more vigorously.
Finally, we're very excited to share our third sustainability and social responsibility report next month, and we'll be providing a strategic update of our long-term plans on April 20.
With that, I'll pass the call to Jeff to discuss our financial results in greater detail as well as our 2021 guidance.
I too would like to begin by expressing my gratitude to all our team members for the extraordinary focus and effort throughout 2020 despite the unprecedented times.
Our entire team adjusted, adapted and continued to execute our priorities.
In Q4, our net sales of $2.4 billion increased 12%.
Adjusted gross profit margin expanded 192 basis points to 45.9%.
driven primarily by inventory-related items, cost and price improvements as well as supply chain leverage.
As our primary focus throughout the year was on the health and safety of our team members and customers, we temporarily paused our physical inventory counts earlier this year.
When we resumed these in Q4, our actual shrink rates were far better than we had anticipated.
This resulted in a benefit in inventory-related costs due to a reduction in the reserve to reflect the positive result.
LIFO-related impacts were a tailwind this quarter versus prior year.
This will be the last quarter we included LIFO impacts in our adjusted financial results as we will begin reporting in Q1 2021 excluding any benefits or expenses from LIFO and our adjusted financial measures.
We believe this adjustment creates a more accurate picture of our operational results and is more in line with industry practices.
Our Q4 adjusted SG&A expense was $913.5 million.
On a rate basis, this represented 38.6% of net sales compared to 36.9% in the fourth quarter of 2019.
The single biggest driver of this increase was $19 million in COVID-related costs directly attributable to the unanticipated spike in case rates.
We also incurred higher Q4 medical claims as a result of lower claims during the prior quarters.
In addition, our short-term incentive compensation for both field and corporate team members was higher than prior year.
Separately, we invested behind the launch of The DieHard is Back campaign.
We also incurred lease termination costs related to the ongoing optimization of our real estate footprint.
We believe these expected investments in DieHard and lease optimization will result in top and bottom line improvements.
Despite higher SG&A expenses, adjusted operating income increased 14.6% in Q4 to $171.8 million.
On a rate basis, our adjusted OI margin expanded by 17 basis points.
Finally, our adjusted diluted earnings per share was $1.87, up 14% from prior year despite a $0.22 impact in the quarter from COVID expenses.
For the full year, which includes an additional week versus 2019, we delivered record net sales of $10.1 billion, which increased 4.1%.
The 53rd, added approximately $158 million to sales.
Our adjusted gross profit increased 5% year-over-year and adjusted gross profit margin expanded 38 basis points.
Adjusted SG&A expense for full year 2020 increased 5.2% from 2019 results.
This was primarily the result of COVID-related expenses discussed earlier as well as the 53rd week.
We estimate the additional week resulted in a headwind of approximately 1.5% to our SG&A costs in the year.
Our adjusted operating income increased 4.1% to $827.3 million.
And our OI margins was 8.2%, flat compared to prior year.
Adjusting for the $60 million in COVID costs, our adjusted operating income margin expanded 59 basis points.
Our full year 2020 adjusted diluted earnings per share was $8.51, which is a new record for Advance and includes a headwind of $0.66 related to COVID costs.
We estimate the impact of the 53rd week was a tailwind from approximately $20 million to adjusted operating income and a benefit of approximately $0.23 to our reported adjusted earnings per share for the year.
Our capital expenditures in Q4 was $75 million for a total investment of $268 million for the year and in line with our previously stated expectations.
As we've noted, some of the critical transformation investments we expected to make in 2020 will pause for a portion of the year.
As a result, we expect our capital spending will increase this year compared to 2020.
Our free cash flow for the year was a record $702 million compared to $597 million in 2019.
This increase was driven by several factors, including efforts we have made to improve working capital.
We made meaningful progress on our AP ratio in 2020, delivered 300 basis points of improve and ended the year at 80.2%.
This in addition to a $76 million tailwind associated with the CARES Act resulted in a significant improvement in our cash conversion cycle.
Our strong cash flow generation allowed us to continue our share repurchase activity in Q4.
For the year, we repurchased more than $458 million of Advance stock.
And including our quarterly cash dividend, we returned $515 million to shareholders.
Our team remains disciplined throughout 2020 to ensure adequate liquidity, protect the P&L during the pandemic and strengthen our balance sheet, which resulted in meaningful improvement in our cash position, resulting in $835 million in cash on hand at year end.
Further demonstrating our confidence in the long-term strength of our business and commitment to return cash to shareholders in a balanced approach utilizing both share repurchases and dividends, our board recently approved a continued payment of our quarterly cash dividend.
While uncertainty remains in the current environment, we believe that we can continue to carry the momentum we have seen in the back half of 2020 forward.
As the economy continues to recover and with our planned new store openings, we expect to deliver increased net sales and additional margin expansion.
Importantly, we expect miles driven to continue improving throughout 2021, which should enable year-over-year growth in our pro business.
We're encouraged by trends through the first four weeks of 2021.
With strength across our DIY omnichannel and pro business, we delivered double-digit comparable sales growth to start the year.
We recognized the importance of transparency.
Despite continued uncertainty, we're pleased to provide our 2021 guidance.
Comparable store sales growth of 1% to 3%.
Adjusted operating income margin rate of 8.7% to 8.9%, which includes margin expansion of 60 to 80 basis points.
That's compared to the 2020 adjusted operating income margin excluding the $20.1 million benefit from the 53rd week.
Income tax rate of 24% to 26%.
Capital expenditures of $275 million to $325 million.
And a minimum of $600 million of free cash flow.
Finally, as Tom mentioned, following several years of closing underperforming stores and focusing on the improvement of operations across our footprint, we're excited to being actively growing our store base and expanding existing and new geographies.
For the first time in four years, we're guiding to new store openings of 50 to 100 locations.
 Assistant:

Chosen response:
compname says q4 same store sales rose 4.7%.
q4 adjusted earnings per share $1.87.
q4 same store sales rose 4.7 percent.
believe actions in q4 position co well to drive additional top-line growth and further margin expansion in 2021.
sees 2021 capital expenditures $ 275 million - $325 million.
sees 2021 net sales $10.1 billion - $10.3 billion.
sees 2021 free cash flow of minimum $600 million.
sees new store openings 50 -100 in 2021.


Prompt:
Human: Both are now available on the Investors section of our website, americanassetstrust.com.
First and foremost, once again we hope that this letter finds you and your loved ones safe.
And our financial results will continue to improve into 2021.
Over the past year the COVID-19 pandemic severely affected most industries, commercial real estate being no exception.
We knew at the onset of the pandemic that American Assets Trust would not be impervious to this economic impact, but we were confident that the high quality, irreplaceable properties and asset class diversity of our portfolio combined with the strength of our balance sheet and ample liquidity would pull us through this.
As we've worked our way through these past 12 months, however, we realized that it is the resiliency of our properties and our company's employees that has enabled us to weather this storm.
And fortunately, to embark on the path to recovery.
We are proud of our response to the challenges presented to us in 2020 and our ability to successfully operate for our company, while keeping our employees and customers as safe as possible.
We've been through hard times before and each time we have emerged stronger, which is our expectation now.
As we celebrate our 10th anniversary of being a New York Stock Exchange listed company, we are reminded that our commitment to our stockholders has always remained front and center.
We will continue to do our best to accretively grew our asset base and shareholder wealth, focusing on both organic growth and development opportunities as they present themselves within our existing portfolios as well as acquisitions in our targeted coastal West Coast markets with a primary focus on the office sector going forward at this time.
Finally, I want to mention that the Board of Directors has approved a quarterly dividend of $0.28 a share for the first quarter, consistent with our previous dividend, which is, we believe is supported by our collection efforts in the first quarter.
The border is -- Board is looking for the rebound in Waikiki which impacts our Embassy Suites and our -- and retail on Waikiki Beach Walk.
Once the mandatory quarantine has been eliminated we [Indecipherable] see the beginning of a recovery in Waikiki which will about -- allow the Board to consider an increase in the dividend.
We are hopeful that this will recur in the third quarter and hopefully sooner.
Adam, Bob and Steve will go into more detail on our various asset segments, collections and financial results.
Now more than ever.
We are feeling more bullish than at any time over the past 12 months, now that the vaccine is widely available, the COVID 19 governmental restrictions in our coastal markets have lightened considerably and we are seeing firsthand the consumer behavior has begun reverting closer to pre-pandemic levels.
Perhaps most significantly in California Governor Newsom announced recently that the state will fully reopen its economy on June 15th, lifting substantially all the restrictions that have guided daily life for more than a year in California, where currently two-thirds of our annualized base rent is derived.
We would expect our other coastal markets to follow similarly in the months to come.
Meanwhile, we are encouraged and seeing our shopping center parking lots full, our office tenants returning or scheduling their return to office, tourism ramping up in Hawaii and public schools in our markets are starting to open back up, allowing parents to return to work, shopping and the like.
Our collections have continued to improve each quarter since the pandemic began and improved each month in Q1 with the collection rate north of 93% for the first quarter.
We expect this collection trend to continue to improve going forward with April at approximately 90% to date.
Furthermore, we had approximately $800,000 of deferred rent due from about 100 tenants in Q1 based on COVID-19 related lease modifications entered into in 2020 and we have collected approximately 88% of those deferred amount, we believe this further validates our strategy of supporting our struggling retailers through the government mandated closure.
Today, we have avoided any material impact from retailer bankruptcy having lost only 13,000 square feet in the aggregate out of our over 3 million square foot retail portfolio, which we believe is a testament to us having superior locations at these restructured tenants want to remain in.
As we mentioned before, we continue working with challenge retailers with a heavy focus currently on those in Waikiki, who historically have been solid operators to bridge them through to the recovery as tourism continues to ramp up, which is primarily from the US Mainland at this point as Asian countries have not yet relaxed COVID restrictions and their travel to Hawaii yet.
Additionally, we are seeing significant positive activity and engagement with new retailers for vacant or distressed spaces in our retail portfolio as we negotiate new retail leases and term sheets, which we will keep you posted on.
On the multifamily front, we have hired a new community manager at our Hassalo on Eighth property who we -- who we expect will lead Hassalo to increased occupancy and better financial results over the remainder of the year.
Furthermore, the 133 unit master lease with the private university in our San Diego multifamily portfolio expires at the end of May and our San Diego multifamily team led by Abigail Rex is fully engaged on additional marketing and advertising campaigns to entice students to remain in expiring units and to attract new prospects.
To date we have leased approximately 20% of those expiring units and expect to have the majority of them released by the end of summer.
Finally, I want to mention that last week we issued our 2020 sustainability report which covers our 2020 operations and highlights our initiatives and commitments across a range of topics, including health and safety, environmental, social responsibility, corporate governor and was prepared entirely in-house at AAT.
These initiatives were a massive collaborative effort from our employee base, led by our sustainability committee with representatives from virtually every department in our company and oversight from our executive management team and Board of Directors.
We are proud of our efforts to-date, particularly our focus on human capital, but we know we have a lot more work to do going forward on all fronts.
Please reach out to any questions.
Last night we reported first quarter 2021 FFO per share of $0.38, first quarter 2021 net income attributable to common stockholders per share of $0.02.
I believe it is important to note that the FFO in the first quarter includes a charge of approximately $4.3 million for the early extinguishment of our $150 million Senior Guaranteed Notes, Series A, which were due on October 31, 2021.
Without the charge for the early extinguishment of debt, our first quarter 2021 FFO per share would have been approximately $0.44.
From a financial perspective, it was a relatively quiet quarter.
We did end up close to our expectations.
Based on the current environment same-store metrics are down in retail as expected and office was also lower for the quarter, but it is expected to end with 8% or greater same-store cash NOI for the year ended 2021.
At the end of the first quarter, net of One Beach, which is under redevelopment, our office portfolio stood at approximately 94% leased, with just 3.4% expiring through the end of 2021.
Our top 10 office tenants represented 50.2% of our total office base rent.
Given the quality of our assets and the strength of the markets in which they are located with technology and life science as the key market drivers.
Our office portfolio has weathered the crisis well.
Current status by region are as follows: Bellevue is 96.5% leased; Portland is 97.1% leased; San Francisco is 100% leased, net of One Beach; and San Diego is 89.1% leased with two buildings under renovation at Torrey Reserve making up 5.8% of San Diego's vacancy and 2.6% of the office portfolio's vacancy.
Our strategy of offering lease term flexibility while preserving pre-COVID rental rates produced 36 comparable new and renewal leases over the last 12 months, totaling 182,000 rentable square feet with a weighted average increase of 8.9% over prior rents on a cash basis and 16.9% on a straight-line basis.
The weighted average lease term was 3.3 years with just $8.7 per rental square foot in TIs and incentives.
We experienced limited small tenant attrition due to COVID and other business challenges during the quarter resulting in a net loss of approximately 31,000 rentable square feet, none of which was lost to a competitor.
However, smaller tenant activity has picked up significantly with tenants willing to commit to longer-term leases at favorable rental rate.
Even more encouraging is the push to return to the office and the emerging large tenant activity and competition for quality larger blocks of space in select markets including San Diego and Bellevue.
We continue to strategically invest in our current portfolio through renovation, redevelopment and ground-up development.
The renovation at two of the 14 buildings at Torrey Reserve should be complete this summer.
In the process, we are enhancing the campus amenities and aggregating large -- large blocks of space in the Del Mar Heights submarket to meet demand and take advantage of pricing power.
Construction has commenced on the redevelopment of One Beach Street in San Francisco with delivery in the first half of 2022 and construction is nearly complete on the redevelopment of 710 Oregon Square in the Lloyd sub-market of Portland.
One Beach will grow to over 102,000 square feet and 710 Oregon Square will add more than 33,000 square feet to our office portfolio.
Construction is also commenced on Tower 3 at La Jolla Commons, a 213,000 square foot, 11 story Class A plus office tower in the UTC submarket of San Diego with expected completion in Q2 or Q3 of 2023.
We are encouraged by the emerging large tenant activity and competition for quality large blocks of space in UTC.
We are optimistic about our office portfolio as we move forward into the rest of 2021 and beyond.
 Assistant:

Chosen response:
compname reports q1 ffo per share $0.38.
q1 ffo per share $0.38.


Prompt:
Human: Both are now available on the Investors section of our website, americanassetstrust.com.
First and foremost, I would like to wish all our stakeholders and their loved ones continued health and safety during these truly unprecedented times.
Now that people are starting to get vaccinated, we are optimistic and even hopeful eventually this pandemic will no longer be a threat, lives will return to some kind of normalcy and the economy will recover.
However, at the present time, this pandemic continues to create challenges within our portfolio, particularly for our three theaters, gym's and our Waikiki Beach Walk properties.
As most of you know, all of our properties in Hawaii are owned fee simple and are very valuable.
We have a strong view that post-pandemic, Waikiki will return to normal, pent up tourism returning and every night being like a Friday night.
While this pandemic still remains a threat that we believe we are well prepared to endure a prolonged pandemic with our irreplaceable portfolio, our best-in-class operating platform, our top-notch management team, our disciplined financial strength and a very strong balance sheet.
In such regard, I am extremely proud to announce that our inaugural public offering, which we closed on January 26, 2021, the offering consists of $500 million of 3.38% senior unsecured notes due 2031.
And by the way, it was oversubscribed 4 times.
Success and demand of this bond offering in the midst of a pandemic is truly a testament to our incredible properties, efficient operating portfolio, and our top-notch management team.
Bob will provide more financial details on the bond offering.
Finally, I'd like to mention that the Board of Directors has approved a quarterly dividend of $0.28 for the first quarter, an increase of $0.03 from our previous dividend, which we believe is supported by our collection efforts in the fourth quarter, and is an expression of our Board's confidence in the embedded growth of our portfolio that we believe will recover post-pandemic.
As you can see, we're mutually cooperative.
We remain optimistic with the overall performance of our portfolio, even in light of the pandemic, and we are pleased to report that 100% of our properties are currently open and accessible by our tenants in each of our markets.
Of course, we too have felt the bumps along the road like everyone else in our sectors.
Yet, our collections of monthly recurring billings due continued to improve in Q4 over Q3 and Q3 over Q2.
The total collections to-date of approximately 92% in Q4 versus 90% in Q3 and 87% in Q2.
January is currently trending consistent with Q4, just over 91% to-date, and likely to increase further, all despite the headwinds of Governor Newsom shutdown restrictions in California that lasted through most of December and January.
Collections for essential tenants in our retail portfolio, which represent approximately one-third of retail build rents were almost 100% in Q3 and Q4.
And collections for nonessential tenants continued to improve from 69% in Q3 to over 74% in Q4.
Of note, no tenant in our retail portfolio represents more than 2% of our ABR, and less than 6% of our retail portfolio is due to expire in 2021, assuming no exercise of lease options.
And of the approximately 500 tenants in our retail portfolio, since the beginning of the pandemic, we have had 13 retailers file bankruptcy, covering 18 total tenant lease spaces, of which 13 spaces have been assumed or are in the process of being assumed in bankruptcy, which we believe is a testament to us having superior locations that these restructured tenants want to remain in.
Notably, the rejected leases to-date were less than 13,000 square feet in the aggregate.
As you would expect, our primary collection challenges remain in the retail segment with our movie theaters and gym's, as well as many of our retailers at Waikiki Beach Walk, which until mid-October had no incoming tourism to sustain meaningful revenue for our tenants.
So, we believe the pent-up demand for travel to Hawaii is massive.
We expect the tourism to rebound to occur at more deliberate pace until a broader vaccine rollout is achieved, hopefully by this upcoming summer.
In the meantime, we are working with these challenged retailers who historically have been great operators to bridge them through to the recovery.
This is part of our recurring thesis of prioritizing long-term strategic growth over the short term.
Despite the uncertainty, we remain optimistic that we will continue to see sequential improvement spurred by the vaccine's distribution, government stimulus and anticipated pent up travel demand in regions that have yet to fully reopen their economies.
As Ernest mentioned, we believe that we are well positioned to navigate through and manage these challenges.
We have been through challenging times before and each time we have emerged stronger, given our long-term focus on high quality, diversified asset base.
We expect this time will be no different.
Last night, we reported fourth quarter and year ended 2020 FFO per share of $0.41 and $1.89 respectively, and fourth quarter and year ended 2020 net income attributable to common stockholders per share of $0.05 and $0.46 respectively.
The lower FFO in the fourth quarter, which is approximately $0.05 lower than the Bloomberg consensus is primarily the result of additional reserves for our theaters, gym's and Waikiki Beach Walk retail.
Nevertheless, we remain optimistic of this portfolio, even in light of the pandemic.
The highlights of this quarter are, one, we have ample liquidity.
As Ernest previously mentioned, we recently completed our inaugural public bond offering.
In the midst of this unprecedented pandemic, we closed on $500 million of 3.38% 10-year senior unsecured notes.
With the proceeds from the offering, we repaid $150 million Senior Guaranteed Notes Series A and repaid the $100 million outstanding on our revolving line of credit.
We expect to use remaining $236 million of proceeds to fund our La Jolla Commons III development in the UTC submarket of San Diego, as well as continue our renovation of One Beach Street in San Francisco, with the remaining amounts for general corporate purposes and potential accretive acquisition opportunities.
At the beginning of this week, we had approximately $380 million of cash on the balance sheet with zero outstanding on our $350 million line of credit.
We chose to access the public debt markets now because of the low treasury yield and strength of the credit markets that we've been seeing during this pandemic.
We had the ability to access the public debt market several years prior to this, but we weren't ready to commit to being a regular issuer on a frequent basis until now.
What's changed is that we have the ability to ladder our existing debt maturities today, so that we have close to, if not more than $400 million in future debt requirements on a recurring basis over an 18 to 24-month period, while at the same time being laser focused on a 5.5 times net debt-to-EBITDA or less.
A conservative balance sheet is very important to us.
During this pandemic, our EBITDA has been challenged, like others with exposure to retail and our hotel, resulting in lower EBITDA.
We believe that our high-quality portfolio and superior close to West Coast locations will begin to return to normal post-pandemic, and our expectation is that our net debt-to-EBITDA will begin working its way back down to 5.5% or less, based on the corporate model that I'm looking at.
Number two, we have embedded contractual growth and cash flow in our office portfolio, with approximately $24 million of in-place growth in just the office cash NOI in '21 and '22.
Number three, our same store cash -- office cash NOI came in at just 3% due to abatements that were provided to our GSA tenants at our First & Main in Portland, Oregon, as part of their lease renewal package during Q1 2020.
These abatements continued through February '21.
Absent these short-term abatements, office same store cash NOI growth in Q4 '20 compared to Q4 '19 would have been approximately 7%.
Number four, multifamily properties incurred mixed results based on their geographic locations.
For our multifamily properties located in Portland, occupancy was down 17% compared to the same quarter last year, while the weighted average monthly base rent increased approximately 1.4%.
For our multifamily properties located in San Diego, occupancy remained stable at approximately the same over the prior year, while the weighted average monthly base rent increased 7.3% over the prior year.
Of note, our occupancy levels in Portland have been trending much higher since the beginning of the year with our recent leasing momentum, bringing optimism that we will return to a more normalized pre-pandemic occupancy level.
Number five, let's talk about guidance.
As previously disclosed, we withdrew our guidance in April 2020, due to the uncertainty that the pandemic would have on our existing guidance, particularly in our mixed use and retail sectors.
Until we have a clear view of the duration of the economic impact and the economy shows signs of recovery, we will refrain from issuing formal guidance.
However, what we can do is provide you a framework on how to think about our portfolio.
We believe that Q4 '20 was close to, if not the bottom of the economic impact for us.
We have taken approximately $18 million in combined bad debt expense reserves in 2020, including turning up most of the straight line rent for which reserves have been taking.
Included in this number is approximately $7.6 million or $0.10 of bad debt expense reserves that were included in our FFO number of $0.41 for Q4 '20.
From my perspective, I believe $0.41 of FFO for Q4 '20 is the bottom.
I would suggest that you conservatively use that as a starting base.
Assume that continues for the first two quarters.
Beginning in Q3 '21, assuming most everyone in America has been vaccinated, I would expect theaters restaurants and especially Waikiki Beach Walk retail and the Embassy Suites Waikiki to begin their recovery.
I would apply some percentage growth to the $0.41 of the Q4 2020 FFO beginning in Q3 '21 and continuing into Q4 '21.
Adjustments that also would need to be made include, in Q1 '21, approximately $0.05 related to the yield maintenance make whole payment on the Series A note prepayment will be a non-recurring expense in Q1 '21.
Also in Q1 '21 through Q4 '21, the additional proceeds from the public bond offering are expected to increase our interest expense by approximately $0.03 per quarter.
As we look beyond '21, we expect to see the following.
First, we expect to see the Embassy Suites Waikiki coming back in full strength in '22, adding approximately another $0.13 of FFO.
Secondly, the Waikiki Beach Walk retail coming back in partial strength in '22, adding approximately another $0.08 of FFO.
Also, in our supplemental this quarter, we have included our estimated development yield for La Jolla Commons III, which is expected to take between 24 and 30 months to develop.
The estimated yield for this development is approximately between 6.5% and 7.5% based on the market conditions today.
We expect this project to be completed by the end of 2023.
A 6.5% yield on $175 million is approximately another $11 million of NOI or $0.14 of FFO.
In the meantime, the cash on the balance sheet earmarked for this development will be a short-term drag on earnings.
And lastly, we expect our One Beach property on the North Waterfront of San Francisco to complete its renovation by the end of 2022, and we expect this property to produce approximately $0.05 plus of FFO upon stabilization in 2023.
For now, this is our informal big picture framework of what we conservatively expect in '21.
But it is not considered or it is not to be considered as formal guidance.
As we have more clarity and conviction on the back half of '21, we will share it with you.
We will continue our best to be as transparent as possible.
At the end of the fourth quarter, net of One Beach, which is under redevelopment, our office portfolio stood at approximately 95% leased, with just under 5% expiring at the end of 2021.
Our top-10 office tenants represents 51.5% of our total office based rent.
Given the quality of our assets and the strength of the markets in which they are located, the technology and life science is the key market drivers and we continue to execute leases at favorable rental rates, delivering continued NOI growth in our office segment even in this challenging environment.
The weighted average base rent increase for the seven renewals completed during the fourth quarter was 5%.
With leases already signed, we have locked in approximately $24 million of NOI growth in our office segment, comprised of approximately $14 million in 2021 and $10 million in 2022.
We anticipate additional NOI growth in 2022 and 2023 through the redevelopments and leasing of 102,000 rentable square feet at One Beach Street in San Francisco and 33,000 rentable square feet at 710 Oregon Square in the Lloyd submarket of Portland.
With the recent entitlements for two blocks at Oregon Square in Portland, we can add up to an additional 555,000 rentable square feet to the portfolio.
However, we continue evaluating market conditions and prospective tenant interest before commencing development of that project.
In the next few months, we will commence construction of Tower 3 at La Jolla Commons, a 213,000 rentable square foot, 11 storey Class A plus office tower in the UTC submarket of San Diego.
With expected completion in Q2 or Q3 of 2023, La Jolla Commons Tower 3 will grow our office portfolio by 6.1%.
We're moving forward because we believe in the long-term fundamentals of the market, especially in UTC.
Direct vacancy remains low at 6.5% and the inventory is aging with just 26% or three out of 22 Class A office buildings being built since 2008, two of which are our own towers at La Jolla Commons.
These 3three newer towers are 97% leased.
The existing office inventory is actually shrinking due to conversion to life science and lab usage in and around UTC.
And record-breaking venture capital is flowing into the region.
San Diego companies raised a record-breaking $2.6 billion of venture capital funding in Q4 of 2020.
The 2020 total reached $5.2 billion.
Life science companies brought in a record $1.8 billion.
The 2020 volume from life science investment reached a record shattering $3.8 billion, and tech investment hit a record high of $762.1 million for the quarter and $1.3 billion for the year.
La Jolla Commons is just a few blocks away from the UTC Mall, which has undergone a $1.2 billion redevelopment, including 90 new tenants and is Westfield's top performing Center.
In the San Diego trolley operations serving UCSD and UTC are expected to begin operations in 2022.
And as for the impact of work-from-home on our portfolio, based upon discussions with many of our tenants, not to mention significant expenditures, our larger tenants are currently investing in their existing spaces.
We expect the impact to be relatively short term in nature.
Beyond our portfolio, even though the tech giants had established long-term work-from-home protocols, they are massively increasing their office footprint by expanding, acquiring buildings and land and leasing significant space across the country, all during COVID.
Facebook has expanded by 2.2 million square feet, Microsoft by 1 million square feet, Amazon by 1.5 million square feet; and Google now plans 3 mixed-use projects on Google owned land, 40 acres in 1.3 million square feet in Mountain View, San Jose and Sunnyvale.
Further, in November, Google bought a 10-acre plot close to its existing campus in Kirkland, Washington, and plans to use it to expand in the area.
Also, Apple just acquired a large land site in Culver City, which is Los Angeles.
for a large office development for at least 1,000 people, at least an additional 336,000 feet in New York City.
In summary, we have a stable office portfolio with a strong tenant roster, no or little near term rollover, significant built in NOI growth and additional upside through repositioning and redevelopment within our existing portfolio, plus substantial new development on sites we already own.
 Assistant:

Chosen response:
q4 ffo per share $0.41.
q4 earnings per share $0.05.


Prompt:
Human: I'm joined today by Roy Harvey, Alcoa Corporation's President and Chief Executive Officer; and William Oplinger, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.
Any reference in our discussion today to EBITDA means adjusted EBITDA.
With that, here's Roy.
We had another strong quarter, bolstered by aluminum prices that are higher than we've seen in more than a decade.
Before we get underway, however, in particularly at a time where we are experiencing a rapidly changing market dynamic, I would like to reinforce once again that our values, which we established when we launched as an independent company in 2016 continue to guide us.
It's not just about the results, but also how we achieve them.
Our values continue to be foundational for our company and our embedded in all of our decisions.
Now, as Alcoa Corporation approaches its five-year anniversary, we've been reflecting on the achievements Alcoans across the globe that helped us to accomplish.
It is clear that our strategic priorities are creating value.
Today, Alcoa is much stronger than when we launched.
We've significantly improved our processes, we've strengthened our balance sheet, we've reshaped our portfolio, we responded to societies need for responsible production launching the industry's most comprehensive portfolio of low-carbon products, and we've also certified many of our assets to the stringent standards of the Aluminum Stewardship Initiative.
In addition, our strategic priorities have helped us to do exactly what we said we wanted to do, strengthen our company to prepare for an even brighter future.
And today, we've reached an important milestone.
Additionally, we've authorized a new share repurchase program that will complement our existing program that was authorized in 2018.
These decisions concerning capital returns align with our existing capital allocation framework and reflect two important points.
First, we have confidence in the strength of our company and our ability to generate cash to sustain these programs through the commodity cycle.
Today, both our balance sheet and operating portfolio are in a much stronger position, with no substantial debt maturities until 2027.
Second, we believe the markets we participate in will be stronger, that this cycle will last longer and then Alcoa is well positioned to deliver in a low-carbon ESG focused world.
But our work is never complete.
These achievements simply serve as a strong foundation.
Despite the positive financial news, I am disappointed that we had a serious injury in the quarter.
An electrical contractor in Brazil sustained a life-threatening electrical shock.
Our focus must always be on the safety of everyone who visits or works at our facilities.
As our comments progress today, I'd like to highlight some recent initiatives that align with our strategic priorities and that use this strong foundation as a starting point.
The Alumar restart that will be powered by renewable energy, the joint development project for high purity alumina and our net-zero ambition.
The green evolution is happening fast and as evidenced by these projects, we are positioning ourselves for the future.
Also, we'll talk more today about the strength in aluminum pricing and an improved pricing trend in Alumina.
But first, let's review the financials with our CFO, Bill Oplinger.
This quarter was even better than the previous one.
Revenues at $3.1 billion were up $276 million or 10% sequentially.
Revenues were up $744 million or 31% from the same period last year on higher aluminum and alumina prices.
Realized aluminum prices were up 13% sequentially and 64% year-over-year.
Third quarter earnings per share was $1.76 per share, $0.13 per share higher than the prior quarter and $2.02 per share higher than the year ago quarter.
Adjusted earnings per share for the third quarter increased 38% sequentially, to a record $2.05 per share.
Adjusted EBITDA, excluding special items also increased, up 18% sequentially to $728 million, much higher than last year's $284 million.
These charts, which debuted last quarter show that the Aluminum segment with modest income taxes and virtually no minority interest continues to outperform and drive record net income.
In the first nine months of 2021, the Aluminum segment has had its best year so far, with nearly $1.4 billion or 73% of Alcoa's total adjusted EBITDA, excluding special items of $1.9 billion.
That segment EBITDA generated record adjusted net income.
Before this year our best full year adjusted net income was in 2018 at $698 million.
In 2021, our adjusted net income for the first nine months is already $822 million or $124 million higher.
Now with Aluminum prices remaining at post global financial crisis highs and Alumina prices recovering nicely, earnings should be even better in the fourth quarter.
Now let's review adjusted EBITDA in more detail.
The $110 million increase in adjusted EBITDA excluding special items was driven by higher metal prices as well as favorable currencies, slightly higher Alumina prices and better product pricing in Alumina and Aluminum.
However, as you know, a Bauxite unloader at Alumar sustained structural damage in mid-July and we ramped down refinery production by roughly one-third with corresponding impacts to Bauxite production assurity [Phonetic].
This outage had a $27 million impact in the quarter, mostly affecting shipment volume and production costs.
In addition, we experienced a few other impacts in the quarter, higher raw material costs, mostly caustic in the Alumina segment and carbon products in smelting, higher energy costs in Europe and to a lesser extent in Brazil were unfavorable by $71 million.
Spain costs increased by $53 million, while we also experienced higher costs in Norway and Brazil.
These increases were favorably offset by strong earnings in the Brazil hydros, the highest earnings in a decade for a net unfavorable energy impact of $17 million.
Lastly in the Aluminum segment, railcar delays in Canada and seasonal shipping patterns in Europe negatively impacted the results in the quarter.
The other column primarily reflects the non-recurrence of the Portland smelter government support, which ended in the second quarter after we repowered the facility through July 2026, and increased accruals for residue storage area improvements in Brazil.
Now let's look at impacts in our cash flows.
The cash flows continue to highlight major corporate actions as well as the benefits from very strong adjusted EBITDA.
To illustrate the strong cash generation in the last quarter, we have bridged from the second quarter ending cash balance to the third quarter cash balance.
Cash declined $200 million to $1.45 billion, our largest single outlay was $518 million in September when we redeemed the 2026 bonds, followed by working capital use of $206 million, $83 million of capital expenditures and a modest $19 million of pension and OPEB funding which is mostly OPEB.
EBITDA and other factors provided net inflows of $626 million.
On a year-to-date basis, you can see the benefit of the strong nine months of EBITDA and the additional major sources of cash inflows, including non-core asset sales and the $500 million bond issue.
Those cash flows and EBITDAs also impact key financial metrics.
Return on equity increased to 30.2% for the first nine months of 2021, nine month 2021 free cash flow less non-controlling interest distributions was negative $51 million due to the second quarter's $500 million pension funding, but was positive $320 million in the third quarter due to the strong EBITDA, partially offset by a three-day increase in days working capital.
Most importantly, our key leverage metric proportional adjusted net debt is now below our $2 billion to $2.5 billion target range at $1.7 billion.
Working capital has increased in line with expectations, as metal prices continue to rise and now are being joined by Alumina price increases.
Moving to our outlook for the remainder of the year.
The full year 2021 outlook is expected to see modest changes.
For Bauxite shipments, the expected ranges are decreasing 1 million tons to 49 million tons to 50 million tons due to the Alumar unloader outage in the third quarter.
We are expecting improvements on the income statement below the EBITDA line.
Depreciation, depletion and amortization is expected to improve $10 million to $665 million, while interest expense is also expected to improve $10 million due to our redemption of the 2026 notes.
In the cash flow section, there are three expected changes.
Return seeking capital expenditures are expected to be $10 million lower.
Payment of prior year taxes has been adjusted $5 million to $30 million and environmental and ARO spending is expected to be $20 million better, down to $120 million for the year.
For the fourth quarter, overall with Alumar refinery production returning close to normal operating levels and if current Aluminum and Alumina index pricing levels persist, we expect another record-setting quarter.
However, at the San Ciprian refinery and smelter, the current high energy costs in the country and the strike if both persists through the quarter end are expected to be primary factors decreasing adjusted EBITDA approximately $100 million sequentially and increasing working capital sequentially $120 million.
Included in the San Ciprian impacts are in refining, we expect sequentially lower shipments of 86,000 metric ton and an unfavorable EBITDA impact of approximately $15 million.
In smelting, we expect sequentially lower shipments of 52,000 metric tons and an unfavorable EBITDA impact of approximately $85 million.
For the rest of the portfolio, adjusted EBITDA in the Bauxite segment is expected to improve $10 million sequentially, primarily due to recovery from the Alumar unloader outage in 3Q 2021.
Aside from Index pricing, currency and the San Ciprian impacts that I mentioned, the Alumina segment adjusted EBITDA is expected to be flat sequentially, higher shipments, cost improvements and the partial recovery from the Alumar unloader outage are expected to offset higher raw materials and energy costs.
In the Aluminum segment, again excluding the San Ciprian impact Index pricing and currency impacts and assuming today's spot alumina prices persist, while we expect substantial benefit in the Alumina segment, Alumina costs in the Aluminum segment are estimated to increase by $100 million.
Higher shipments are expected to offset increased raw materials and production costs, energy related impacts are expected to be comprised of two factors.
$30 million as Brazil hydro sales seasonally decline and higher smelter energy costs of $20 million primarily in Norway.
As Bill noted, the Aluminum segment has a significant role in our profitability.
The LME Aluminum price was the highest that has been in 13 years and has doubled relative to the low point in the second quarter of 2020.
In addition, regional premiums are being influenced by higher transportation costs into deficit markets such as North America and Europe.
The continued economic recovery and the tightness of supply have continued to support this LME rally and high regional premiums.
We continue to see positive GDP in industrial production across the world's leading economies, which supports Aluminum demand across all major end-use sectors.
This year, we expect annual global demand for primary Aluminum to increase approximately 10% relative to 2020 and to surpass the pre-pandemic levels of 2019.
Strong demand is also being supported by China's continued status as a net importer of primary Aluminum.
In 2021, China has curtailed more than 2 million tons of annualized capacity due to power shortages and its enforcement of policies related to energy and the environment.
These curtailments represent one of the largest supply cuts the Aluminum industry has ever experienced, particularly given that they are occurring during a year in which we have seen strong demand growth.
These supply dynamics are not only occurring in China.
There have been recent reports in Europe regarding energy shortages and high power costs that may lead to smelting cuts there as well.
For Alcoa's commercial impacts, we are also seeing significant year-over-year growth for our value-add Aluminum products.
In the third quarter, the premiums we earn for value-add products were up relative to the second quarter.
Strong demand supported high spot premiums for open volumes.
Much of our volume for value-add products is sold in annual contracts.
So, only a portion benefits from high spot pricing.
However, current market dynamics provide a positive environment for 2022 contract negotiations.
Next, I'd like to comment on what we're seeing in the Aluminum market, which is also on the rise.
As we've noted previously, we are the world's largest third-party producer of Alumina and market fundamentals there have also become more favorable over this last month.
In the first two months of the quarter, ex-China Alumina prices remained more muted than in Aluminum, high freight costs made shipments to China unattractive and the market outside China had sufficient supply.
However, in the last month or so, we have seen a substantial rally in ex-China Alumina pricing.
Some unplanned production disruptions outside of China reduced the amount of Alumina available for spot purchases.
At the same time, some refineries in China have restricted production to be the same dynamics I discussed earlier in regards to the smelting cuts.
Power shortages and policies related to the environment in energy.
These dynamics have driven current global supply tightness in Alumina.
While China remains short in Alumina as a net importer, it is now competing with smelters outside of China for available Alumina.
As a result, prices for Alumina outside of China are at the highest levels they've been since 2018.
Now, let's move to a slide that recap some of the items that Alcoa has been doing to support our business for the future.
Our strategic actions over the past two years and our ongoing activities are positioning Alcoa for the future.
Two years ago, we announced three key strategic programs.
The new operating model, non-core asset sales amd the portfolio review.
We've already met the goals on two of these.
First, we fully implemented the new operating model and captured the annual savings.
Second, we also met the top end of our target for non-core asset sales.
The portfolio review, meanwhile, has three years remaining and was designed to improve both the cost structure and sustainability position of our global production assets, focusing primarily on smelting and refining.
It considers options for significant improvement, curtailment, closure or divestiture.
At this two year mark, we've already addressed nearly half the 1.5 million tons of smelting capacity with a repowering at Portland, the curtailment of Intalco and restarting Alumar.
The announced restart of 268,000 metric tons of smelting capacity in Brazil equates to our share of Alumar's nameplate capacity.
It will supply the short Brazilian market and the smelter will be fully powered with renewable energy by 2024.
We've earlier reported that 78% of our global smelters are powered by renewables, and we expect that percentage to reach 85% by the conclusion of the portfolio review in 2024.
In refining, we've also addressed half of our global goal of 4 million tons of refining capacity with the 2019 closure of the Point Comfort refinery in Texas.
Now, let's move to the right hand side of this slide.
In September, we took another step to strengthen our balance sheet and redeemed in full $500 million in senior notes issued at a 7% interest rate that were due in 2026.
We used cash on hand to repurchase this debt.
A stronger financial position is an outcome of our focus on aligning decisions with our strategic priorities, including our imperative to advance sustainably.
Last month, we added even more production facilities to our list of locations certified to the Aluminum Stewardship Initiative, the industry's most comprehensive third-party system to verify responsible production.
Today we have 15 global sites certified to ASIs Performance Standard, the latest were two Canadian smelters, ABI and Deschambault.
Congratulations to those teams in Quebec for earning these certifications.
Importantly, we also have ASIs Chain of Custody Certification, which allows us to sell ASI certified Bauxite, Alumina and Aluminum.
And we've earned a premium on ASI certified products, which we can sell globally.
Earlier this month, we also announced the beginning of a joint development project related to the market for high purity alumina or HPA.
Industry analysis shows that demand for HPA will be strong with increasing year-over-year demand due to the need for low carbon solutions in transportation and other sectors.
Our non-metallurgical alumina, HPA, is used to create a variety of products for a sustainable economy.
This includes lithium-ion batteries that are the backbone of clean emissions free electric vehicles and energy efficient LED lighting applications.
While we are still at an early stage of development, we believe our process knowledge of Alumina refining can help ensure the operational and financial success of this joint development project.
And more generally, across our alumina refineries, it is important to note that Alcoa has the world's lowest carbon intensity in its global refining system.
This too was an advantage now and in the future for our smelter grade and non-metallurgical businesses, both of which are the largest outside of China.
Finally, I am proud of our ambition to reach net-zero by 2050 for Scope 1 and Scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions across our global operations.
Announced earlier this month, this ambition complements our Climate Change policy and existing GHG targets, which we discussed more fully in our Annual Sustainability Report.
To work toward this ambition, we are focused on increasing the share of our operations powered by renewable energy and commercializing some of the breakthrough innovations we've discussed previously, such as the ELYSIS technology which eliminates all direct greenhouse gases from the traditional aluminum smelting process and adapting Mechanical Vapor recompression to Alumina refining to further reduce our already low-carbon intensity.
Next, I wanted to quickly highlight the news we announced earlier today.
We are proud to initiate this quarterly dividend and authorized a new buyback program.
Since Alcoa Corporation's launch nearly five years ago, we've talked about strengthening our company.
This announcement is clear evidence of the work that Alcoans across the globe have completed to position the company to succeed not only in the favorable market environment we're seeing now, but through the commodity cycle.
Today, Alcoa is stronger than it has been since our inception, and with our current view of the markets and expected cash flows, we believe these programs can be sustained.
The decision regarding capital returns aligns with our current capital allocation framework.
To review the framework prioritizes maintaining liquidity and investing capital to sustain and improve our operations.
Next, we aim to maximize value creation opportunities across four categories listed in no specific order.
One of those, of course, is returning cash to stockholders, which we've demonstrated today.
Now, let me briefly highlight the other three value creation opportunities.
First, we've made great progress in reducing our debt.
As mentioned, our adjusted proportional net debt is now below our target range of $2.0 billion to $2.5 billion.
Today, our company has no substantial debt maturities until 2027 and our expected cash pension funding requirements are at their lowest levels.
As we've said previously, our net debt may fluctuate, but we intend to maintain a strong balance sheet through this cycle.
Second, another focus is the transformation of our portfolio, building on the progress we have already made in this five-year program.
Finally, we continue to evaluate value creating growth projects and pursue opportunities that will generate an adequate rate of return.
First, it's a very good time to be in the upstream aluminum business.
We have a long position in all three of our segments and the work that we've accomplished while continuing has made us more competitive, enabling us to succeed through the commodity cycle, because of this work we are well positioned to capture benefits from improved markets, including the very healthy aluminum prices that we're currently seeing.
Next, I'm proud to say that Alcoa Corporation is stronger today than any other time.
Our strategies are working and our balance sheet is in its best shape ever.
This improved financial strength has allowed more flexibility to execute on our capital allocation framework, including the authorization of further returns to our investors.
Finally, we are ready for a sustainable future.
As we approach our five-year anniversary next month, I'm excited about what's ahead as we move forward as a stronger company that can deliver value to our people, our processes and our products.
Operator, who do we have our first question?
 Assistant:

Chosen response:
compname reports q3 adj earnings per share of $2.05 excluding items.
alcoa sets another record for quarterly net income and earnings per share.
q3 adjusted earnings per share $2.05 excluding items.
q3 earnings per share $1.76.
q3 revenue $3.1 billion versus refinitiv ibes estimate of $2.91 billion.
2021 shipment outlook for alumina and aluminum segments remains unchanged.
anticipates continued positive financial results in q4 of 2021.
working capital increase in q4 related to san ciprián could approximate $120 million.
continues to expect a strong 2021 based on continued economic recovery and increased demand for aluminum in all end markets.
expects annual global demand for primary aluminum to increase about 10% relative to 2020 and to surpass pre-pandemic levels in 2019.
alcoa corporation initiates quarterly cash dividend and new share repurchase program.
initiation of a quarterly cash dividend on its common stock and a new $500 million share repurchase program.
have no substantial debt maturities until 2027.