“Next, our guidance incorporates an effective tax rate between 23% and 25%.”

In context

“butable to Deere & Company in the second quarter was $162 million. Net income was positively impacted by a higher average portfolio balance, which was partially offset by a higher provision for credit losses and less favorable financing spreads. As a reminder, net income in the second quarter of 2023 was also impacted by a nonrepeating onetime accounting correction. For fiscal year 2024, our outlook for net income remains at $770 million as benefits from a higher average portfolio balance offset a higher provision for credit losses and less favorable financing spreads. Finally, Slide 13 outlines our guidance for Deere & Company's net income, our effective tax rate and operating cash flow. For fiscal year '24, our outlook for net income is now expected to be approximately $7 billion. Next, our guidance incorporates an effective tax rate between 23% and 25%. And lastly, cash flow from the equipment operations is now projected to be in the range of $7 billion to $7.25 billion. This concludes our formal comments. We'll now shift to a few topics specific to the quarter. Let's begin with Deere's performance this quarter. We saw net sales decline roughly 15% year-over-year, yet operating margin came in at just over 21%. Across all business segments, we saw better-than-expected performance despite a more challenging macro backdrop. Josh Beal, can you walk us through what went well for Deere? Josh Beal: Yes. Absolutely, Josh. This is really a story of executional discipline across the organization. We were able to outperform on the top line as demand held up slightly better than we expected. In particular, we saw resilient earthmoving and road”