ManpowerGroup

constant currency to $596 million. The APME region continues to perform relatively well during this crisis. Excluding restructuring charges and prior year gain on the China IPO, OUP margin decreased 90 basis points. All of the $1.5 million of restructuring costs involve Australia, where we continue to simplify the business after exiting certain low margin staffing clients. Revenue growth in Japan was up 5% on a constant currency basis, and after adjusting for billing days, this represented a 6% growth rate, which was equal to the growth rate in the second quarter. Our Japan business continues to perform very well, and we expect a revenue trend of flat to low single digit growth in the fourth quarter. Revenues in Australia declined 7% in constant currency on a days adjusted basis. This represented a significant improvement from the 21% decline in the second quarter as we anniversary the exiting of certain low margin business. Revenue and other markets in Asia Pacific Middle East declined 10% in constant currency. I'll now turn to cash flow and balance sheet. Free cash flow equaled 685 million for the first nine months of the year. This compared to underlying free cash flow in the prior year of 356 million after excluding the sale of the France CICE receivable. During the third quarter, free cash flow equaled 108 million compared to 206 million in the prior year quarter. At quarter end, day sales outstanding decreased by about three days. Collection activities continue to be one of our top priorities. Capital expenditures represented 31 million during the first nine months of the year. We did not purchase any shares of stock during the third quarter, and our year-to-date purchases stand at 871,000 shares of stock for 64 million. As of September 30th, we have 5.9 million shares remaining for repurchase under the six million share program approved in August of 2019. Our balance sheet was strong at quarter end with cash of 1.59 billion and total debt of 1.09 billion, resulting in a net cash position of 500 million. Our debt ratios remain comfortable at quarter end with gross debt to trailing 12 months EBITDA of 2.21 and total debt to total capitalization at 29%. Our debt and credit facility did not change in the quarter and the earliest Euronote maturity is not until September of 2022. In addition, our revolving credit facility for 600 million remained unused. Next, I'll review our outlook for the fourth quarter of 2020. Our guidance continues to assume no material lockdowns impacting economic activity in any of our largest markets. On that basis, we are forecasting earnings per share for the fourth quarter to be in the range of $1.06 to $1.14, which includes a favorable impact from foreign currency of 3 cents per share. Our constant currency revenue guidance range is between a decline of 10% to a decline of 12%. The midpoint of our constant currency guidance a decline of 11 percent, also reflects the organic days-adjusted rate of decline, as billing days for Q4 are only very slightly higher year over year, and the impact of net dispositions is also very slight. This represents an improvement of about 4 percent from the organic days-adjusted constant currency decline of 15 percent in the third quarter. We expect our operating profit margin during the fourth quarter to be down 130 basis points compared to the prior year. This reflects continued strong cost actions, but at lower levels of year-over-year SG&A reductions as activity levels progressively increase. We expect our income tax rate in the fourth quarter to approximate 39%, which continues to reflect an outsized impact of the French business tax effect that I discussed in previous quarters. Late September, the government of France issued their preliminary budget for 2021. France is planning to reduce the French business tax, known as CVAE, by 50% in 2021. If the budget is approved as drafted, this would improve our pre-crisis level global effective tax rate by 3% to 3.5%. This improvement in the effective tax rate would be partially offset by higher compensation costs attributed to profit-sharing schemes in France. Additionally, France has indicated that they continue with their multi-year corporate tax reform schedule, which is expected to separately reduce the France corporate tax rate by about 3% next year, and the impact to the consolidated effective tax rate is a reduction between 50 and 75 basis points. I will give a further update on the anticipated impacts from these items at our fourth quarter earnings call after the French budget is formally approved by the government. As usual, our guidance does not incorporate restructuring charges or additional share repurchases, and we estimate our weighted average shares to be 58.6 million. I will now turn it back to Jonas.

Thank you, Jack. We're very well positioned to leverage the lasting legacy of the pandemic. New work models with more flexible and remote work more focus on health and well-being, greater use of technology and faster changing skill shifts, and the need for strategic and operational workforce transformation at scale and speed. Let me also say how incredibly proud I am of the critical work our talent and teams have provided by helping people and companies around the world respond and reset following these unprecedented crises. from redeploying and reskilling catering and hospitality workers, to new roles in in-demand sectors like logistics, virtual customer service, and pharmaceuticals, to redeploying financial programmers to install and program COVID testing robots, and providing the skilled IT talent, lab technicians, and skilled workers for PPE production. We have remained steadfast in our purpose and committed to providing our clients candidates, and our communities around the world with skilled talent and meaningful employment, all with health and safety at the center. And I thank all of our people for their expertise, professionalism, and dedication when so many of them are managing their own personal challenges in these unprecedented times. We can be certain, too, that helping people adapt from declining industries and jobs to growth sectors and future-proof roles will be critical in this next normal. And it will be the responsibility of business, government, and educators to support people with swift, targeted upskilling programs so that value creation is shared with the many, not just with the few, for the benefit of us all. At MAMPAR Group, we're fully committed to being part of the solution, and the actions we're taking to digitize, diversify, and innovate will position our company for further success in 2021 and beyond. I would now like to open the call for Q&A. Operator?

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, please press star 1. Please unmute your phone and record your name clearly and slowly once prompted. Your name is needed to introduce your question. And to cancel your request, please press star 2. One moment please for our first question. Our first question came from the line of Andrew Steinerman of JP Morgan. Your line is now open.