Inventory at the end of the third quarter was $1.93 billion, up from $1.79 billion in the prior year quarter. Day sales of inventory at quarter-end was 103 days compared to 100 days in the prior year quarter.
After the cash outflow of $76 million for acquisitions to further strengthen the Company’s wireless connectivity capabilities, and $33 million of accreted interest paid to settle the 2022 Tranche A of the convertible bond issued in 2017, free cash flow (non-U.S. GAAP) was negative $25 million in the third quarter, compared to positive $170 million in the year-ago quarter.

In the third quarter, the Company paid cash dividends totaling $38 million.

ST’s net financial position (non-U.S. GAAP) was $662 million at September 26, 2020 compared to $570 million at June 27, 2020 and reflected total liquidity of $3.53 billion and total financial debt of $2.87 billion.

During the quarter, ST exercised the call option for the early redemption of its 2022 Tranche A of the convertible bond issued in 2017. As a consequence, bondholders exercised their conversion rights on the total of $750 million of the Tranche A bond. ST net settled the bond, mostly in the third quarter with the remaining small portion at the beginning of Q4, by delivering $750 million in cash and about 11 million shares from treasury shares. Simultaneously with the exercise of the call option, ST issued a new $1.5 billion dual-tranche senior unsecured convertible bond (Tranche A and Tranche B for $750 million each) due 2025 and 2027.

Business Outlook

The Company’s guidance, at the mid-point, for the 2020 fourth quarter is:

• Net revenues are expected to be $2.99 billion, an increase of 12.0% sequentially, plus or minus 350 basis points;
• Gross margin of about 38.5%, plus or minus 200 basis points;
• This outlook is based on an assumed effective currency exchange rate of approximately $1.15 = €1.00 for the 2020 fourth quarter and includes the impact of existing hedging contracts.
• The fourth quarter will close on December 31, 2020.

Conference Call and Webcast Information

STMicroelectronics will conduct a conference call with analysts, investors and reporters to discuss its third quarter 2020 financial results and current business outlook today at 9:30 a.m. Central European Time (CET) / 3:30 a.m. U.S. Eastern Time (ET). A live webcast (listen-only mode) of the conference call will be accessible at ST’s website, http://investors.st.com, and will be available for replay until November 6, 2020.

Use of Supplemental Non-U.S. GAAP Financial Information

This press release contains supplemental non-U.S. GAAP financial information.

Readers are cautioned that these measures are unaudited and not prepared in accordance with U.S. GAAP and should not be considered as a substitute for U.S. GAAP financial measures. In addition, such non-U.S. GAAP financial measures may not be comparable to similarly titled information from other companies.

See the Appendix of this press release for a reconciliation of the Company’s non-U.S. GAAP financial measures to their corresponding U.S. GAAP financial measures. To compensate for these limitations, the supplemental non-U.S. GAAP financial information should not be read in isolation, but only in conjunction with the Company’s consolidated financial statements prepared in accordance with U.S. GAAP.

Forward-looking Information

Some of the statements contained in this release that are not historical facts are statements of future expectations and other forward-looking statements (within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 or Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, each as amended) that are based on management’s current views and assumptions, and are conditioned upon and also involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results, performance, or events to differ materially from those anticipated by such statements, due to, among other factors:

• changes in global trade policies, including the adoption and expansion of tariffs and trade barriers, that could affect the macro-economic environment and adversely impact the demand for our products;
• uncertain macro-economic and industry trends, which may impact end-market demand for our products;
• customer demand that differs from projections;
• the ability to design, manufacture and sell innovative products in a rapidly changing technological environment;
• changes in economic, social, public health, labor, political, or infrastructure conditions in the locations where we, our customers, or our suppliers operate, including as a result of macroeconomic or regional events, military conflicts, social unrest, labor actions, or terrorist activities;
• unanticipated events or circumstances, which may impact our ability to execute our plans and/or meet the objectives of our R&D and manufacturing programs, which benefit from public funding;
• the Brexit vote and the impact of the withdrawal of the U.K. may adversely affect business activity, political stability and economic conditions in the U.K., the Eurozone, the EU and elsewhere. The U.K. withdrawal from the EU took place on January 31, 2020 and the UK majority government is expected to complete Brexit even if no formal withdrawal agreement is in place with the EU by the end of the transition period running until December 31, 2020. The specific terms of the U.K. withdrawal from the EU are still uncertain and while we do not have material operations in the U.K. and have not experienced any material impact from Brexit on our underlying business to date, we cannot predict its future implications;
• financial difficulties with any of our major distributors or significant curtailment of purchases by key customers;
• the loading, product mix, and manufacturing performance of our production facilities and/or our required volume to fulfill capacity reserved with suppliers or third party manufacturing providers;
• availability and costs of equipment, raw materials, utilities, third-party manufacturing services and technology, or other supplies required by our operations;
• the functionalities and performance of our IT systems, which are subject to cybersecurity threats and which support our critical operational activities including manufacturing, finance and sales, and any breaches of our IT systems or those of our customers or suppliers;
• theft, loss, or misuse of personal data about our employees, customers, or other third parties, and breaches of global and local privacy legislation, including the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”);
• the impact of intellectual property (“IP”) claims by our competitors or other third parties, and our ability to obtain required licenses on reasonable terms and conditions;
• changes in our overall tax position as a result of changes in tax rules, new or revised legislation, the outcome of tax audits or changes in international tax treaties which may impact our results of operations as well as our ability to accurately estimate tax credits, benefits, deductions and provisions and to realize deferred tax assets;
• variations in the foreign exchange markets and, more particularly, the U.S. dollar exchange rate as compared to the Euro and the other major currencies we use for our operations;
• the outcome of ongoing litigation as well as the impact of any new litigation to which we may become a defendant;
• product liability or warranty claims, claims based on epidemic or delivery failure, or other claims relating to our products, or recalls by our customers for products containing our parts;
• natural events such as severe weather, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcano eruptions or other acts of nature, the effects of climate change, health risks and epidemics such as the COVID-19 in locations where we, our customers or our suppliers operate;
• industry changes resulting from vertical and horizontal consolidation among our suppliers, competitors, and customers; and
• the ability to successfully ramp up new programs that could be impacted by factors beyond our control, including the availability of critical third party components and performance of subcontractors in line with our expectations.

Such forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties, which may cause actual results and performance of our business to differ materially and adversely from the forward-looking statements. Certain forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward looking terminology, such as “believes,” “expects,” “may,” “are expected to,” “should,” “would be,” “seeks” or “anticipates” or similar expressions or the negative thereof or other variations thereof or comparable terminology, or by discussions of strategy, plans or intentions.