While we are still fighting inflationary pressures, cost increases have slowed from last year, and our restructuring and efficiency initiatives have helped strengthen profitability.

Our aerospace and commercial transportation markets are particularly robust this year, and we expect overall market conditions to remain strong.

We are experiencing the bottom-line impact of productivity improvements and the elimination of waste,

However, as these markets continued to decline in the third quarter, it became likely that even with our efforts, third-quarter earnings will probably fall below the 2000 second-quarter level.

achieve future sustained savings and profitable growth.

The fourth quarter has proven to be extremely challenging as a result of lower volumes, depressed metal prices, and overall weak downstream markets.