NOTE 11—COMMITMENTS AND CONTINGENCIES

Litigation and Claims

The Company is from time to time party to various lawsuits, claims and other proceedings that arise in the ordinary course of its business. With respect to all such lawsuits, claims and proceedings, the Company records a reserve when it is probable that a liability has been incurred and the amount of loss can be reasonably estimated. The Company does not believe that the resolution of any currently pending lawsuits, claims and proceedings, either individually or in the aggregate, will have a material adverse effect on its financial position, results of operations or liquidity. However, the outcomes of any currently pending lawsuits, claims and proceedings cannot be predicted, and therefore, there can be no assurance that this will be the case.

A putative shareholder class action, captioned Budde v. Global Power Equipment Group Inc., was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas naming the Company and certain former officers as defendants. This action and another action were filed on May 13, 2015 and June 23, 2015, respectively, and on July 29, 2015, the court consolidated the two actions and appointed a lead plaintiff. On May 1, 2017, the lead plaintiff filed a second consolidated amended complaint that named the Company and three of its former officers as defendants. It alleged violations of the federal securities laws arising out of matters related to the Company’s restatement of certain financial periods and claims that the defendants made material misrepresentations and omissions of material fact in certain public disclosures during the putative class period in violation of Sections 10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and Rule 10b-5, as promulgated thereunder. The claims were filed on behalf of a putative class of persons who acquired the Company’s stock between September 7, 2011 and May 6, 2015, and sought monetary damages of “more than $200 million” on behalf of the putative class and an award of costs and expenses, including attorneys’ fees and experts’ fees. On June 26, 2017, the Company and the individual defendants filed a motion to dismiss the complaint. After full briefing, on December 27, 2017, the court issued a memorandum opinion and order granting the motion to dismiss and allowing the plaintiffs until January 15, 2018 to file an amended complaint. The court found that, with respect to each of the defendants, plaintiffs failed to plead facts supporting a strong inference of scienter, or the required intent to deceive, manipulate or defraud, or act with severe recklessness. On January 15, 2018, the plaintiffs filed their third amended complaint, and in response the Company filed a renewed motion to dismiss. After full briefing and oral argument, on September 11, 2018, the court dismissed with prejudice the third amended complaint. The court found that, even with plaintiffs’ amended allegations, plaintiffs failed to plead facts supporting a strong inference of scienter. Also on September 11, 2018, plaintiffs filed a notice of appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Plaintiffs’ appeal is briefed and currently pending before that court. Litigation is subject to many uncertainties, and the outcome of this action is not predictable with assurance. At this time, the Company is unable to predict the possible loss or range of loss, if any, associated with the resolution of this litigation, or any potential effect such may have on the Company or its business or operations.

In previous periods, the Company reported that a former operating unit of the Company had been named as a defendant in a limited number of asbestos personal injury lawsuits. Neither the Company nor its predecessors ever mined, manufactured, produced or distributed asbestos fiber, the material that allegedly caused the injury underlying these actions. As of April 2019, all pending asbestos-related litigation against such former operating unit had been dismissed, and there are no longer any such claims outstanding against the unit. Such litigation did not have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial position, results of operations or liquidity.