PG, §1A diff (2018 → 2019)

Item 1A. Risk Factors. We discuss our expectations regarding future performance, events and outcomes, such as our business outlook and objectives in this Form 10-K, quarterly and annual reports, press releases and other written and oral communications. All statements, except for historical and present factual information, are “forward-looking statements” and are based on financial data and business plans available only as of the time the statements are made, which may become outdated or incomplete. We assume no obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of new information, future events or other factors. Forward-looking statements are inherently uncertain, and investors must recognize that events could significantly differ from our expectations. The following discussion of “risk factors” identifies significant factors that may adversely affect our business, operations, financial position or future financial performance. This information should be read in conjunction with the MD&A and the Consolidated Financial Statements and related Notes incorporated in this report. The following discussion of risks is not all inclusive, but is designed to highlight what we believe are important factors to consider when evaluating our expectations. These and other factors could cause our future results to differ from those in the forward-looking statements and from historical trends. Our business is subject to numerous risks as a result of our having significant operations and sales in international markets, including foreign currency fluctuations, currency exchange or pricing controls and localized volatility. We are a global company, with operations in approximately 70 countries and products sold in more than 180 countries and territories around the world. We hold assets, incur liabilities, earn revenues and pay expenses in a variety of currencies other than the U.S. dollar, and our operations outside the U.S. generate more than fifty percent of our net revenue. Fluctuations in exchange rates for foreign currencies may reduce the U.S. dollar value of revenues, profits and cash flows we receive from non-U.S. markets, increase our supply costs (as measured in U.S. dollars) in those markets, negatively impact our competitiveness in those markets or otherwise adversely impact our business results or financial condition. Moreover, discriminatory or conflicting fiscal or trade policies in different countries, including changes to tariffs and existing trade policies and agreements, could adversely affect our results. See also the Results of Operations and Cash Flow, Financial Condition and Liquidity sections of the MD&A and Note 9 to our Consolidated Financial Statements. We also have businesses and maintain local currency cash balances in a number of countries with currency exchange, import authorization, pricing or other controls or restrictions, such as Nigeria, Algeria, Egypt and Turkey. Our results of operations and financial condition could be adversely impacted if we are unable to successfully manage such controls and restrictions, continue existing business operations and repatriate earnings from overseas, or if new or increased tariffs, quotas, exchange or price controls, trade barriers or similar restrictions are imposed on our business. Additionally, our business, operations or employees may be adversely affected by political volatility, labor market disruptions or other crises or vulnerabilities in individual countries or regions, including political instability or upheaval, broad economic instability or sovereign risk related to a default by or deterioration in the credit worthiness of local governments, particularly in emerging markets. Uncertain global economic conditions may adversely impact demand for our products or cause our customers and other business partners to suffer financial hardship, which could adversely impact our business. Our business could be negatively impacted by reduced demand for our products related to one or more significant local, regional or global economic disruptions, such as: a slow-down in the general economy; reduced market growth rates; tighter credit markets for our suppliers, vendors or customers; a significant shift in government policies; the deterioration of economic relations between countries or regions, including potential negative consumer sentiment toward non-local products or sources; or the inability to conduct day-to-day transactions through our financial intermediaries to pay funds to or collect funds from our customers, vendors and suppliers. Additionally, economic conditions may cause our suppliers, distributors, contractors or other third-party partners to suffer financial difficulties that they cannot overcome, resulting in their inability to provide us with the materials and services we need, in which case our business and results of operations could be adversely affected. Customers may also suffer financial hardships due to economic conditions such that their accounts become uncollectible or are subject to longer collection cycles. In addition, if we are unable to generate sufficient income and cash flow, it could affect the Company’s ability to achieve expected share repurchase and dividend payments. The Procter & Gamble Company 3 Disruptions in credit markets or changes to our credit ratings may reduce our access to credit. A disruption in the credit markets or a downgrade of our current credit rating could increase our future borrowing costs and impair our ability to access capital and credit markets on terms commercially acceptable to us, which could adversely affect our liquidity and capital resources or significantly increase our cost of capital. Disruption in our global supply chain may negatively impact our business results. Our ability to meet our customers’ needs and achieve cost targets depends on our ability to maintain key manufacturing and supply arrangements, including execution of supply chain optimizations and certain sole supplier or sole manufacturing plant arrangements. The loss or disruption of such manufacturing and supply arrangements, including for issues such as labor disputes, loss or impairment of key manufacturing sites, discontinuity in our internal information and data systems, inability to procure sufficient raw or input materials, significant changes in trade policy, natural disasters, increasing severity or frequency of extreme weather events due to climate change or otherwise, acts of war or terrorism or other external factors over which we have no control, could interrupt product supply and, if not effectively managed and remedied, have an adverse impact on our business, financial condition or results of operations. Our businesses face cost fluctuations and pressures that could affect our business results. Our costs are subject to fluctuations, particularly due to changes in the prices of commodities and raw materials and the costs of labor, transportation, energy, pension and healthcare. Therefore, our business results are dependent, in part, on our continued ability to manage these fluctuations through pricing actions, cost saving projects and sourcing decisions, while maintaining and improving margins and market share. Failure to manage these fluctuations could adversely impact our financial results. Our ability to meet our growth targets depends on successful product, marketing and operations innovation and successful responses to competitive innovation and changing consumer habits. We are a consumer products company that relies on continued global demand for our brands and products. Achieving our business results depends, in part, on successfully developing, introducing and marketing new products and on making significant improvements to our equipment and manufacturing processes. The success of such innovation depends on our ability to correctly anticipate customer and consumer acceptance and trends, to obtain, maintain and enforce necessary intellectual property protections and to avoid infringing upon the intellectual property rights of others. We must also successfully respond to technological advances made by, and intellectual property rights granted to, competitors. Failure to continually innovate, improve and respond to competitive moves and changing consumer habits could compromise our competitive position and adversely impact our results. The ability to achieve our business objectives is dependent on how well we can compete with our local and global competitors in new and existing markets and channels. The consumer products industry is highly competitive. Across all of our categories, we compete against a wide variety of global and local competitors. As a result, we experience ongoing competitive pressures in the environments in which we operate, which may result in challenges in maintaining profit margins. To address these challenges, we must be able to successfully respond to competitive factors and emerging retail trends, including pricing, promotional incentives, product delivery windows and trade terms. In addition, evolving sales channels and business models may affect customer and consumer preferences as well as market dynamics, which, for example, may be seen in the growing consumer preference for shopping online, ease of competitive entry into certain categories, and growth in hard discounter channels. Failure to successfully respond to competitive factors and emerging retail trends, and effectively compete in growing sales channels and business models, particularly e-commerce and mobile commerce applications, could negatively impact our results. A significant change in customer relationships or in customer demand for our products could have a significant impact on our business. We sell most of our products via retail customers, which include mass merchandisers, e-commerce, grocery stores, membership club stores, drug stores, department stores, distributors, wholesalers, baby stores, specialty beauty stores, high-frequency stores and pharmacies. Our success is dependent on our ability to successfully manage relationships with our retail trade customers, which includes our ability to offer trade terms that are mutually acceptable and are aligned with our pricing and profitability targets. Continued concentration among our retail customers could create significant cost and margin pressure on our business, and our business performance could suffer if we cannot reach agreement with a key customer on trade terms and principles. Our business could also be negatively impacted if a key customer were to significantly reduce the inventory level or shelf space of our products as a result of increased offerings of private label brands and generic non-branded products or for other reasons, significantly tighten product delivery windows or experience a significant business disruption. If the reputation of the Company or one or more of our brands erodes significantly, it could have a material impact on our financial results. The Company's reputation, and the reputation of our brands, form the foundation of our relationships with key stakeholders and other constituencies, including consumers, customers and suppliers. The quality and safety of our products are critical to our business. Many of our brands have worldwide recognition and our financial success is directly dependent on the success of our brands. The success of our brands can suffer if our marketing plans or product initiatives do not have the desired impact on a brand's image or its ability to attract consumers. Our results could also be negatively impacted if 4 The Procter & Gamble Company one of our brands suffers substantial harm to its reputation due to a significant product recall, product-related litigation, defects or impurities in our products, product misuse, changing consumer perceptions of certain ingredients or environmental impacts, allegations of product tampering or the distribution and sale of counterfeit products. Additionally, negative or inaccurate postings or comments on social media or networking websites about the Company or one of its brands could generate adverse publicity that could damage the reputation of our brands or the Company. If we are unable to effectively manage real or perceived issues, including concerns about safety, quality, ingredients, efficacy, environmental impacts or similar matters, sentiments toward the Company or our products could be negatively impacted and our financial results could suffer. Our Company also devotes time and resources to citizenship efforts that are consistent with our corporate values and are designed to strengthen our business and protect and preserve our reputation, including programs driving ethics and corporate responsibility, strong communities, diversity and inclusion, gender equality and environmental sustainability. If these programs are not executed as planned or suffer negative publicity, the Company's reputation and financial results could be adversely impacted. We rely on third parties in many aspects of our business, which creates additional risk. Due to the scale and scope of our business, we must rely on relationships with third parties, including our suppliers, contract manufacturers, distributors, contractors, commercial banks, joint venture partners and external business partners, for certain functions. If we are unable to effectively manage our third-party relationships and the agreements under which our third-party partners operate, our financial results could suffer. Additionally, while we have policies and procedures for managing these relationships, they inherently involve a lesser degree of control over business operations, governance and compliance, thereby potentially increasing our financial, legal, reputational and operational risk. An information security or operational technology incident, including a cybersecurity breach, or the failure of one or more key information or operations technology systems, networks, hardware, processes, and/or associated sites owned or operated by the Company or one of its service providers could have a material adverse impact on our business or reputation. As part of the Company’s regular review of potential risks, we maintain an information and operational technology (“IT/OT”) risk management program that is primarily supervised by information technology management and reviewed by internal cross-functional stakeholders. As part of this program, analyses of emerging cybersecurity threats as well as the Company’s plans and strategies to address them are regularly prepared and presented to senior management, the Audit Committee and the Board of Directors. Despite our policies, procedures and programs, including this IT/OT risk management program, we may not be effective in identifying and mitigating every risk to which we are exposed. We rely extensively on IT/OT systems, networks and services, including internet and intranet sites, data hosting and processing facilities and technologies, physical security systems and other hardware, software and technical applications and platforms, many of which are managed, hosted, provided and/or used by third parties or their vendors, to assist in conducting our business. The various uses of these IT/OT systems, networks and services include, but are not limited to: • ordering and managing materials from suppliers; • converting materials to finished products; • shipping products to customers; • marketing and selling products to consumers; • collecting, transferring, storing and/or processing customer, consumer, employee, vendor, investor, and other stakeholder information and personal data, including such data from persons covered by an expanding landscape of privacy and data regulations, such as citizens of the European Union who are covered by the General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”); • summarizing and reporting results of operations, including financial reporting; • managing our banking and other cash liquidity systems and platforms; • hosting, processing and sharing, as appropriate, confidential and proprietary research, business plans and financial information; • collaborating via an online and efficient means of global business communications; • complying with regulatory, legal and tax requirements; • providing data security; and • handling other processes necessary to manage our business. Numerous and evolving information security threats, including advanced persistent cybersecurity threats, pose a risk to the security of our services, systems, networks and supply chain, as well as to the confidentiality, availability and integrity of our data and of our critical business operations. As cybersecurity threats rapidly evolve in sophistication and become more prevalent across the industry globally, the Company is continually increasing its attention to these threats. We assess potential threats and vulnerabilities and make investments seeking to address them, including ongoing monitoring and updating of networks and systems, increasing specialized information security skills, deploying employee security training, and updating security policies for the Company and its third-party providers. However, because the techniques, tools and tactics used in cyber-attacks frequently change and may be difficult to detect for periods of time, we may face difficulties in anticipating and implementing adequate preventative measures or fully mitigating harms after such an attack. Our IT/OT databases and systems and our third-party providers’ databases and systems have been, and will likely continue to be, subject to advanced computer viruses or other malicious codes, ransomware, unauthorized access attempts, denial of service attacks, phishing, social engineering, hacking and other cyber-attacks. Such attacks may originate from The Procter & Gamble Company 5 outside parties, hackers, criminal organizations or other threat actors, including nation states. In addition, insider actors-malicious or otherwise-could cause technical disruptions and/or confidential data leakage. To date, we have seen no material impact on our business or operations from these attacks; however, we cannot guarantee that our security efforts or the security efforts of our third-party providers will prevent material breaches, operational incidents or other breakdowns to our or our third-party providers’ IT/OT databases or systems. Periodically, we also need to upgrade our IT/OT systems or adopt new technologies. If such a new system or technology does not function properly or otherwise exposes us to increased cybersecurity breaches and failures, it could affect our ability to order materials, make and ship orders, and process payments in addition to other operational and information integrity and loss issues. Further, if the IT/OT systems, networks or service providers we rely upon fail to function properly or cause operational outages or aberrations, or if we or one of our third-party providers suffer significant unavailability of key operations, or inadvertent disclosure of, lack of integrity of, or loss of our sensitive business or stakeholder information, due to any number of causes, ranging from catastrophic events or power outages to improper data handling, security incidents or employee error or malfeasance, and our business continuity plans do not effectively address these failures on a timely basis, we may be exposed to reputational, competitive, operational, financial and business harm as well as litigation and regulatory action. The costs and operational consequences of responding to the above items and implementing remediation measures could be significant and could adversely impact our results. Changing political conditions could adversely impact our business and financial results. Changes in the political conditions in markets in which we manufacture, sell or distribute our products may be difficult to predict and may adversely affect our business and financial results. For example, the United Kingdom’s pending withdrawal from the European Union ("Brexit") has created uncertainty regarding, among other things, the U.K.'s future legal and economic framework and how the U.K. will interact with other countries, including with respect to the free movement of goods, services, capital and people. In addition, results of elections, referendums or other political processes in certain markets in which our products are manufactured, sold or distributed could create uncertainty regarding how existing governmental policies, laws and regulations may change, including with respect to sanctions, taxes, the movement of goods, services, capital and people between countries and other matters. The potential implications of such uncertainty, which include, among others, exchange rate fluctuations, tariffs, trade barriers and market contraction, could adversely affect the Company’s business and financial results. We must successfully manage compliance with laws and regulations, as well as manage new and pending legal and regulatory matters in the U.S. and abroad. Our business is subject to a wide variety of laws and regulations across the countries in which we do business, including those laws and regulations involving intellectual property, product liability, product composition or formulation, packaging content or disposability, marketing, antitrust, data protection, environmental (including climate, water, waste), employment, anti-bribery, anti-corruption, tax, accounting and financial reporting or other matters. Rapidly changing laws, regulations, policies and related interpretations, as well as increased enforcement actions, create challenges for the Company, including our compliance and ethics programs, may alter the environment in which we do business and may increase the ongoing costs of compliance, which could adversely impact our financial results. If we are unable to continue to meet these challenges and comply with all laws, regulations, policies and related interpretations, it could negatively impact our reputation and our business results. Failure to successfully manage regulatory and legal matters and resolve such matters without significant liability or damage to our reputation may materially adversely impact our results of operations and financial position. Furthermore, if pending legal or regulatory matters result in fines or costs in excess of the amounts accrued to date, that may also materially impact our results of operations and financial position. Changes in applicable tax regulations and resolutions of tax disputes could negatively affect our financial results. The Company is subject to taxation in the U.S. and numerous foreign jurisdictions. Changes in the various tax laws can and do occur. For example, the U.S. government enacted comprehensive tax legislation commonly referred to as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (the “U.S. Tax Act”). The changes included in the U.S. Tax Act are broad and complex. The ongoing impacts of the U.S. Tax Act may differ from the estimates provided elsewhere in this report, possibly materially, due to, among other things, changes in interpretations, any regulatory guidance or legislative action to address questions that arise or any updates or changes to estimates the Company has used to calculate the impacts. Additionally, longstanding international tax norms that determine each country’s jurisdiction to tax cross-border international trade are subject to potential evolution. An outgrowth of the original Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (“BEPS") project is a new project undertaken by the 129 member countries of the expanded OECD Inclusive Framework focused on "Addressing the Challenges of the Digitalization of the Economy." The breadth of this project extends beyond pure digital businesses and is likely to impact all multinational businesses by potentially redefining jurisdictional taxation rights. As this and other tax laws and related regulations change or evolve, our financial results could be materially impacted. Given the unpredictability of these possible changes, it is very difficult to assess whether the overall effect of such potential tax changes would be cumulatively positive or negative for our earnings and cash flow, but such changes could adversely impact our financial results. Furthermore, we are subject to regular review and audit by both foreign and domestic tax authorities. While we believe our tax positions will be sustained, the final outcome of tax audits and related litigation, including maintaining our intended tax treatment of divestiture transactions such as the fiscal 2017 6 The Procter & Gamble Company Beauty Brands transaction with Coty, may differ materially from the tax amounts recorded in our Consolidated Financial Statements, which could adversely impact our cash flows and financial results. We must successfully manage ongoing acquisition, joint venture and divestiture activities. As a company that manages a portfolio of consumer brands, our ongoing business model includes a certain level of acquisition, joint venture and divestiture activities. We must be able to successfully manage the impacts of these activities, while at the same time delivering against our business objectives. Specifically, our financial results could be adversely impacted by the dilutive impacts from the loss of earnings associated with divested brands or dissolution of joint ventures. Our financial results could also be impacted by acquisitions or joint venture activities, such as the integration of Merck KGaA's Consumer Health business acquired in fiscal 2019, if: 1) changes in the cash flows or other market-based assumptions cause the value of acquired assets to fall below book value, or 2) we are not able to deliver the expected cost and growth synergies associated with such acquisitions and joint ventures, including as a result of integration and collaboration challenges, which could also have an impact on goodwill and intangible assets. Our business results depend on our ability to successfully manage productivity improvements and ongoing organizational change. Our financial projections assume certain ongoing productivity improvements and cost savings, including staffing adjustments as well as employee departures. Failure to deliver these planned productivity improvements and cost savings, while continuing to invest in business growth, could adversely impact our financial results. Additionally, successfully executing organizational change, including the move to a new organizational structure in fiscal 2020, management transitions at leadership levels of the Company and motivation and retention of key employees, is critical to our business success. Factors that may affect our ability to attract and retain sufficient numbers of qualified employees include employee morale, our reputation, competition from other employers and availability of qualified personnel. Our success is dependent on identifying, developing and retaining key employees to provide uninterrupted leadership and direction for our business. This includes developing and retaining organizational capabilities in key growth markets where the depth of skilled or experienced employees may be limited and competition for these resources is intense, as well as continuing the development and execution of robust leadership succession plans. Item 1B.