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Text: Our conference call slides have been posted on our website and provide additional information that may be helpful.
Sales totaled $367 million this quarter, a decrease of 14% from the second quarter last year.
Acquisitions added two percentage points of growth this quarter, while changes in currency translation rates decreased sales by approximately one percentage point.
Net earnings totaled $29 million for the quarter or $0.17 per diluted share, including $30 million or $0.20 related to the impairment charges associated with selling the Alco business.
After adjusting for the impairment and other tax adjustments, net earnings totaled $62 million or $0.37 per diluted share.
During the second quarter, we entered into negotiations to divest the U.K. valve business, Alco, which has significant exposure to oil and gas natural gas markets.
Alco operations contributed $7 million of sales and $2 million of operating losses year-to-date, which have been included within the Process segment.
Based on the negotiations to sell, our investment in Alco was revalued in the second quarter, and we recorded noncash impairment charges of $34 million after tax, including $24 million of previously unrecognized foreign currency translation losses recorded in accumulated other comprehensive income.
The $24 million loss reserve for previously unrecognized foreign currency translation is recorded in other current liability at the end of the second quarter and will be cleared through accumulated other comprehensive income in the third quarter, as the divestiture was finalized in early July.
Our gross margin rate was 49.8% for the second quarter, approximately three percentage points below the second quarter last year.
Primarily due to the effect of product and channel mix, as sales in the Contractor segment increased, while sales in the Industrial and Process segments declined double digits and also due to lower factory volumes and changes in currency translation rates.
Realized pricing was favorable.
Without recovery in sales volumes, unabsorbed factory costs will continue to weigh on gross margin rates in the second half, so strong realized pricing partially offsets the favorable effect.
Changes in product and channel mix can affect gross margin rates.
Our global procurement team has been working closely with our supply chain to keep our lines running throughout the quarter.
Given the growth in certain products in the Contractor segment, particularly products for the home center channel, the supply chain for some components is stretched and we are monitoring the situation closely.
Operating expenses, excluding the effect of the impairment, decreased by $12 million from the second quarter last year, as reductions in volume and earnings based expenses more than offset higher product development costs.
The reported income tax rate was 31% for the quarter, 13 percentage points higher than the second quarter last year, primarily due to nondeductible impairment charges.
After adjusting for the effect of the impairment and excess tax benefits from stock option exercises and other nonrecurring tax benefits, our tax rate was 19% for the quarter or one percentage point lower than last year.
Cash flows from operations totaled $143 million year-to-date as compared to $164 million last year as a result of lower revenues.
Capital expenditures totaled $33 million year-to-date as we continue to invest in manufacturing capabilities as well as the expansion of several locations.
Cash dividends totaled $58 million year-to-date.
We also completed an acquisition for $27 million in the second quarter, which will be a part of the Process segment.
For the full year 2020 capital expenditures are expected to be approximately $80 million, including approximately $50 million for facility expansion projects.
We completed share repurchases of $17 million net of share issuances during the quarter, bringing our total share repurchases net of issuances to $62 million for the year.
We may make further opportunistic share repurchases going forward.
A few final comments, looking forward to the rest of the year.
On Page 11 of our slide deck, we note our six-week booking average by segment.
These are the six-week average bookings through last week, July 17.
Based on current exchange rates and the same volume and mix of products and sales by currency as last year, the effective exchange is currently expected to be negligible on sales and a headwind of approximately one percentage on earnings in 2020.
Unallocated corporate expenses are expected to be approximately $30 million for the full year 2020 and can vary by quarter.
The effective tax rate is expected to be approximately 20% to 21% for the full year, excluding the effect of onetime items and any impact from excess tax benefits related to stock option exercises.
And given the wild environment in the second quarter, I'll focus my commentary on our operational status, our strategic focus, sales trends as we progress through the quarter and make a few observations on end markets.
Our major factories and distribution centers remained fully operational during the second quarter.
High-risk employees remained at home, and we've dealt with the positive COVID-19 cases that we have experienced at various facilities without disruption.
By reducing our use of temporary labor in certain factories and flexing our workforce to areas of greater need, we've largely been able to survive the quarter without resorting to lay offs or pay reductions.
We had enough work in all of our major factories to keep our full-time people productive.
Overall, I'm very pleased with the resolve our employees have shown and continue to show throughout this pandemic.
Consistent with what we told you during the first quarter call, we've continued full speed on our growth initiatives.
Any expense reductions in the second quarter were the result of variable expenses, such as rebates and incentives as well as reduced spending on travel and prudent discretionary expense management.
Spending on our initiatives for 2021 and beyond have continued as usual.
This may put pressure on our short-term financial results, but will position us to capitalize when market conditions normalize.
Consolidated order trends improved sequentially throughout the quarter.
However, the improvement has not been consistent between the segments.
After a terrible April, our Contractor business rebounded with a very strong June, resulting in low single-digit growth for the quarter.
Professional paint channel improved, as paint stores opened up to foot traffic.
And the Home Center business has been on fire for most of the quarter, resulting in operational challenges to meet the demand spike.
The outlook for the Contractor business is positive for the second half of the year.
Our Industrial business, on the other hand, experienced marginal improvement after the business tanked in April.
Access to customer facilities is slowly improving and quoting activity has increased in many sectors or we're yet to see a significant bounce back in orders.
Automotive is weak globally, industrial production is down, oil and gas is weak, and uncertainty continues to weigh in to weigh on the capital equipment appetite of most end users.
The outlook for Industrial remains cloudy, and I'm not overly optimistic about the second half.
Our Process business didn't drop as severely in April.
And despite being down double digits for the quarter, we've seen some positive end market trends.
Within this business, we have stronger end markets such as semiconductor and environmental and weaker end markets such as our lubrication business, which has performed comparably to our Industrial segment.
With a wide range of end market exposures, our outlook for the second half remains uncertain.
I'm comfortable that our approach of continuing to invest in our growth strategies, such as new product and new market development, will position us nicely to drive strong results once things normalize.
We used a similar approach during the 2008, 2009 crisis and our investors were subsequently rewarded and we look to repeat this again.

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qtrly earnings per share $0.17.
qtrly adjusted earnings per share $0.37.

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