Contacts:
UPS Media Relations: 404-828-7123 or [email protected]
UPS Investor Relations: 404-828-6059 (option 2) or [email protected]

UPS CEO Carol Tomé and CFO Brian Newman will discuss first-quarter results with investors and analysts during a conference call at 8:30 a.m. ET, April 27, 2021. That call will be open to others through a live Webcast. To access the call, go to www.investors.ups.com and click on "Earnings Webcast." Additional financial information is included in the detailed financial schedules being posted on www.investors.ups.com under "Financials" and as filed with the SEC as an exhibit to our Current Report on Form 8-K.

UPS (NYSE:UPS) is one of the world's largest package delivery companies with 2020 revenue of $84.6 billion, and provides a broad range of integrated logistics solutions for customers in more than 220 countries and territories. The company's more than 540,000 employees embrace a strategy that is simply stated and powerfully executed: Customer First. People Led. Innovation Driven. UPS is committed to being a steward of the environment and positively contributing to the communities we serve around the world. UPS also takes a strong and unwavering stance in support of diversity, equity and inclusion. The company can be found on the Internet at www.ups.com, with more information at www.stories.ups.com and www.investors.ups.com.

This release and our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission contain and in the future may contain "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Statements other than those of current or historical fact, and all statements accompanied by terms such as "will," "believe," "project," "expect," "estimate," "assume," "intend," "anticipate," "target," "plan," and similar terms, are intended to be forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are made subject to the safe harbor provisions of the federal securities laws pursuant to Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.

From time to time, we also include written or oral forward-looking statements in other publicly disclosed materials. Such statements may relate to our intent, belief and current expectations about our strategic direction, prospects and future results, and give our current expectations or forecasts of future events; they do not relate strictly to historical or current facts. Management believes that these forward-looking statements are reasonable as and when made. However, caution should be taken not to place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements because such statements speak only as of the date when made.

Forward-looking statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from our historical experience and our present expectations or anticipated results. These risks and uncertainties, include, but are not limited to: continued uncertainties related to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our business and operations, financial performance and liquidity, our customers and suppliers, and on the global economy; changes in general economic conditions, in the U.S. or internationally; significant competition on a local, regional, national and international basis; changes in our relationships with our significant customers; changes in the regulatory environment in the U.S. or internationally; increased or more complex physical or data security requirements; legal, regulatory or market responses to global climate change; results of negotiations and ratifications of labor contracts; strikes, work stoppages or slowdowns by our employees; the effects of changing prices of energy, including gasoline, diesel and jet fuel, and interruptions in supplies of these commodities; changes in exchange rates or interest rates; uncertainty from the expected discontinuance of LIBOR and transition to any other interest rate benchmark; our ability to maintain our brand image; our ability to attract and retain qualified employees; breaches in data security; disruptions to the Internet or our technology infrastructure; interruptions in or impacts on our business from natural or man-made events or disasters including terrorist attacks, epidemics or pandemics; our ability to accurately forecast our future capital investment needs; exposure to changing economic, political and social developments in international and emerging markets; changes in business strategy, government regulations, or economic or market conditions that may result in impairment of our assets; increases in our expenses or funding obligations relating to employee health, retiree health and/or pension benefits; potential additional U.S. or international tax liabilities; potential claims or litigation related to labor and employment, personal injury, property damage, business practices, environmental liability and other matters; our ability to realize the anticipated benefits from acquisitions, dispositions, joint ventures or strategic alliances; our ability to realize the anticipated benefits from our transformation initiatives; cyclical and seasonal fluctuations in our operating results; our ability to manage insurance and claims expenses; and other risks discussed in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission from time to time, including our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2020 and subsequently filed reports. You should consider the limitations on, and risks associated with, forward-looking statements and not unduly rely on the accuracy of predictions contained in such forward-looking statements. We do not undertake any obligation to update forward-looking statements to reflect events, circumstances, changes in expectations, or the occurrence of unanticipated events after the date of those statements.

We supplement the reporting of our financial information determined under generally accepted accounting principles ("GAAP") with certain non-GAAP financial measures, including "adjusted" compensation and benefits, operating expenses, operating profit, operating margin, other income and (expense), income before income taxes, income tax expense, effective tax rate, net income and earnings per share. We supplement the reporting of revenue, revenue per piece and operating profit with adjusted measures that exclude the period over period impact of foreign currency exchange rate changes and hedging activities, and we disclose free cash flow. The equivalent measures determined in accordance with GAAP are also referred to as "reported" or "unadjusted."

We believe that these non-GAAP measures provide additional meaningful information to assist users of our financial statements in understanding our financial results and cash flows and assessing our ongoing performance, because they exclude items that may not be indicative of, or are unrelated to, our underlying operations and may provide a useful baseline for analyzing trends in our underlying businesses. These non-GAAP measures are used internally by management for business unit operating performance analysis, business unit resource allocation and in connection with incentive compensation award determinations.

Currency-neutral revenue, revenue per piece and operating profit are calculated by dividing current period reported U.S. dollar revenue, revenue per piece and operating profit by the current period average exchange rates to derive current period local currency revenue, revenue per piece and operating profit. The derived amounts are then multiplied by the average foreign exchange rates used to translate the comparable results for each month in the prior year period (including the period over period impact of foreign currency hedging activities). The difference between the current period reported U.S. dollar revenue, revenue per piece and operating profit and the derived current period U.S. dollar revenue, revenue per piece and operating profit is the period over period impact of currency fluctuations.

We recognize changes in the fair value of plan assets and net actuarial gains and losses in excess of a 10% corridor for our pension and postretirement defined benefit plans immediately as part of other pension income (expense). We supplement the presentation of our income before income taxes, net income and earnings per share with non-GAAP measures that exclude the impact of gains and losses recognized in excess of the 10% corridor and the related income tax effects. We believe excluding these mark-to-market impacts provides important supplemental information by removing the volatility associated with short-term changes in market interest rates, equity values, and similar factors.

We calculate free cash flow as cash flows from operating activities less capital expenditures, proceeds from disposals of property, plant and equipment, and plus or minus the net changes in finance receivables and other investing activities. We believe free cash flow is an important indicator of how much cash is generated by regular business operations and we use this as a measure of incremental cash available to invest in our business, meet our debt obligations and return cash to shareowners.