BUSINESS ACQUISITIONS

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2018

BUSINESS ACQUISITIONS [Abstract]

BUSINESS ACQUISITIONS

NOTE 15 – BUSINESS ACQUISITIONS

On January 1, 2018, the Company completed the acquisition of Application Specialties, Inc. ("ASI"), a distributor of cutting tools, abrasives, coolants and machine shop supplies. The Company paid approximately $11.5 million for ASI. The purchase was financed with $10.6 million of cash on hand as well as issuing $0.9 million of the Company's common stock. ASI will provide the Company's metal working division with new geographic territory and enhance DXP's end market mix. With ASI, we continue to build on our strategy of providing a breadth of technical products and services on a regional and local level. ASI provides us scale and access to the U.S. Pacific Northwest market, while allowing us to continue to serve our customer's evolving needs within our Service Center segment. For the three months ended March 31, 2018, the business acquired contributed sales of $10.6 million and earnings before taxes of approximately $1.3 million.