Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from Chris Glynn - Oppenheimer.
Chris Glynn - Oppenheimer
Fourth quarter cash flow is typically the strongest of the year. Any movement around that normal trend this year, should that be the typically expectation again?
Richard K. Reece
Yes. I think, we will continue to see the strong cash flow generation as we come off of a very robust summer season. For certain of our product lines, we were able to bring inventories down a little bit, and we are hoping to do that again at the end of this fourth quarter, as well as the elevated sales we tend to have in the second half of the year as we collect on those receivables. Some of it of course would depend on the timing of sales throughout the quarter, but our expectation, Chris, is consistent with prior years that we would hope to have a good strong cash flow in the fourth quarter.
Vernon J. Nagel
Chris, I would also comment that with a couple of vendors, we have been offered rather favorable cash discounts. We have taken advantage of those opportunities and those have pushed our days payable down a little bit. So where we have continued to trend favorably in terms of our working capital usage, we did take advantage of some opportunities there. So that has had some minor impact on overall cash flow. But again, we continue to generate favorable cash flow, as Ricky pointed out, we would expect to do that.
Chris Glynn - Oppenheimer
Given the stock price reaction today, just wondering how much was left on the repurchase authorization? And then with the cash and the availability on the revolver would you lever up in this environment? It’s off $4 or $5.
Richard K. Reece
Yes, we have got a million shares remaining under the authorization from our Board. And we will continue to look at stock repurchase as one opportunity to use cash. We haven’t contemplated at this point, Chris, to lever up, to recapitalize by repurchasing shares and using our line.
But we do want to keep some dry powder, so that acquisition opportunities, which we think may become more plentiful in this less robust market or at least more favorably priced in this less robust market, and we want to be able to take advantage of that. Plus we are seeking to retain our investment grade rating as we all saw during this winter and into the spring and summer that non-investment markets have been shutout. And we have certainly appreciated having the flexibility of being investment grade should the right opportunity come up. So we are sensitive to that.
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