|
|
|
We are exposed to financial instrument market risk from changes in foreign currency exchange rates, interest rates and to a limited extent, commodity prices. We selectively manage these exposures through the use of derivative instruments to mitigate our market risk from these exposures. The objective of our risk management program is to protect our cash flows related to sales or purchases of goods or services from market fluctuations in currency rates. Our use of derivative instruments includes the following types of market risk:
- volatility of the currency rates;
- time horizon of the derivative instruments;
- market cycles; and
- the type of derivative instruments used.
We do not use derivative instruments for trading purposes. We do not consider any of these risk management activities to be material. See Note 1 for additional information on our accounting policies on derivative instruments. See Note 16 for additional disclosures related to derivative instruments.
We have exposure to interest rate risk from our long-term debt and related interest rate swaps.
The following table represents principal amounts of our long-term debt at December 31, 2001 and related weighted average interest rates by year of maturity for our long-term debt.
Fair market value of long-term debt was $1.3 billion as of December 31, 2001.
We have two interest rate swaps which convert fixed rate debt to variable rate debt. One of our interest rate swaps hedges $150 million of the 6% fixed rate medium-term notes and has a fair value of $3.4 million at December 31, 2001. Under this interest rate swap agreement, the counter party pays a fixed rate of 6% interest and we pay a variable interest rate based on published 6-month LIBOR interest rates. The payments under the agreement are settled on February 1 and August 1 of each year until August 2006, and coincide with the interest payment dates on the hedged debt instrument. The other interest rate swap hedges $139 million of our 8% long-term debt and has a fair value of a loss of $0.2 million at December 31, 2001. Under this interest rate swap agreement, the counter party pays a fixed rate of 8% interest and we pay a variable interest rate based on published 6-month LIBOR interest rates. The payments under the agreement are settled on April 15 and October 15 of each year until April 2003, and coincide with the interest payment dates on the hedged debt instrument.
In the fourth quarter of 2000 we approved a plan to reorganize our engineering and construction businesses into one business unit. This restructuring was undertaken because our engineering and construction businesses continued to experience delays in customer commitments for new upstream and downstream projects. With the exception of deepwater projects, short-term prospects for increased engineering and construction activities in either the upstream or downstream businesses were not positive. As a result of the reorganization of the engineering and construction businesses, we took actions to rationalize our operating structure including write-offs of equipment, engineering reference designs and capitalized software of $20 million and recorded severance costs of $16 million. See Note 11.
During the second quarter of 1999, we reversed $47 million of our 1998 special charges related to the acquisition of Dresser Industries, Inc., and industry downturn. This was based on our reassessment of total costs to be incurred to complete the actions covered in the charges.
|
|
|