Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from Doug Anmuth – Barclays Capital.
Doug Anmuth – Barclays Capital
In terms of working capital, can you just give us a sense of whether suppliers are changing their terms at all in terms of needing their cash any sooner in the current environment? And is there anything structurally different about your ability to generate free cash flow now other than the slowdown and actually the decline in sales? And how much cash do you think is needed to run the business? What’s sort of the minimum that you think about on the balance sheet?
Diane Irvine
If you look at supplier terms, no we haven’t changed terms and if anything I think as we’ve discussed over time we have extended our terms each and every year. And that continues. In terms of things being structurally different, I’ll let Marc comment but I think what Marc was saying is if you look at with floater growth you don’t have the same dynamics in the negative working capital. But in terms of our ability to generate free cash that’s certainly there very strongly in the business.
As to how much cash we need, I think certainly at current levels we feel great about our cash position and it will continue to build, as I discussed even in the case of with the month of October where we looked at that level. So I think our model allows us to continue to generate profitability and free cash and you just don’t have that same dynamic in the negative working capital.
Marc D. Stolzman
I think the only thing I might add is that the EBITDA year-over-year is very much a factor of maintaining the variable expenses within our model. And we seek very strongly to control that in consistent with our sales. The free cash flow dynamics, inventory versus our accounts payable, are usually a shorter term factor of either rising or falling sales and then it re-stabilizes so that the underlying EBITDA and cash flow generation are very consistent.
Operator
Your next question comes from Mark Mahaney – Citigroup.
Mark Mahaney – Citigroup
That 20% year-over-year decline in October, was that U.S. or was that a global number? And then if – are there incremental steps you’d want to take over the next six to nine months to more aggressively take market share? Or do you just run the business as is and as traditional retailers some likely have to fold up you’ll just take that market share as it comes? Or do you want to try to accelerate that market share gain?
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