Commitments and Contingent Liabilities

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2017

Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]

NOTE 13. COMMITMENTS AND CONTINGENT LIABILITIES

Contingent liabilities associated with guarantees—In the ordinary course of business, we enter into standby letters of credit, performance bonds, surety bonds and other guarantees with financial institutions for the benefit of our customers, vendors and other parties. The majority of these financial instruments expire within four years. Management does not expect any of these financial instruments to result in losses that, if incurred, would have a material adverse effect on our consolidated financial position, results of operations or cash flows.

Guarantees consisted of the following:


(In millions)	March 31, 2017
Financial guarantees ⁽¹⁾	$	827.7
Performance guarantees ⁽²⁾		3,952.1

Maximum potential undiscounted payments	$	4,779.8

⁽¹⁾

Financial guarantees represent contracts that contingently require a guarantor to make payments to a guaranteed party based on changes in an underlying agreement that is related to an asset, a liability, or an equity security of the guaranteed party. These tend to be drawn down only if the Company fails to fulfill its financial obligations.

⁽²⁾

Performance guarantees represent contracts that contingently require a guarantor to make payments to a guaranteed party based on another entity’s failure to perform under a nonfinancial obligating agreement. Events that trigger payment are performance related, such as failure to ship a product or provide a service.

Contingent liabilities associated with legal matters—On March 29, 2016, Dong Energy (“Dong”) terminated, on the grounds of an alleged material breach, a contract signed on February 27, 2012 with a consortium of Technip France and Daewoo Shipping & Marine Engineering Co., Ltd. This contract covered engineering, procurement, fabrication, hook-up and commissioning assistance for a fixed wellhead and process platform and associated facilities for the Hejre field offshore Denmark. Dong announced that it will not complete and does not intend to take possession of the platform. The parties are currently in arbitration to resolve contract disputes related to the performance and cessation of work under the contract.

We are involved in various pending or potential legal actions or disputes in the ordinary course of our business. Management is unable to predict the ultimate outcome of these actions because of their inherent uncertainty. However, management believes that the most probable, ultimate resolution of these matters will not have a material adverse effect on our consolidated financial position, results of operations or cash flows.