NOTE 15 - INCOME TAXES

The effective tax rate for the three and nine month periods ended June 30, 2018 and 2017 was as follows:


	Three Month Periods Ended		Nine Month Periods Ended
Effective tax rate	June 30, 2018	June 30, 2017	June 30, 2018	June 30, 2017
SBH	(518.9%)	83.7%	2,192.9%	1,583.9%
SB/RH	22.8%	27.9%	(111.7)%	33.6%

On December 22, 2017, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (the "Tax Reform Act") was signed into law. The legislation significantly changes U.S. tax law by, among other things, lowering corporate income tax rates, implementing a dividends received deduction for dividends from foreign subsidiaries and imposing a tax on deemed repatriated accumulated earnings of foreign subsidiaries. The Tax Reform Act reduces the U.S. corporate income tax rate from a maximum of 35% to a flat 21% rate, effective January 1, 2018. The Company’s applicable U.S. statutory tax rate for Fiscal 2018 will be approximately 24.5%.

Deferred tax assets and liabilities are measured using enacted tax rates expected to apply to taxable income in the years in which those temporary differences are expected to reverse. As a result of the reduction in the U.S. corporate income tax rate from 35% to 21% under the Tax Reform Act, the Company revalued its ending net deferred tax liabilities at December 31, 2017 and recognized a provisional $206.7 million tax benefit in the Company’s net income from continuing operations for the three month period ended December 31, 2017. The Company reduced the provisional tax benefit by $8.0 million in the three month period ended June 30, 2018 to reflect additional information regarding the Fiscal 2018 reversing temporary differences. The Company determined the impact of the U.S. federal corporate income tax rate change on the U.S. deferred tax assets and liabilities is provisional because certain of the timing differences reversing at the Company’s Fiscal 2018 blended rate must be estimated until the Fiscal 2018 reversing timing differences are known.

As a result of the Spectrum Merger, the Company and Spectrum will join in the filing of a US consolidated tax return starting July 13, 2018. The form of the Spectrum Merger allows for the Company’s capital and net operating loss carryforwards to be able to be used to offset Spectrum’s future income and the US tax gain on the sale of the GBL business to Energizer. As a result, for the three month period ended June 30, 2018, the Company released $335.0 million of valuation allowance on its U.S. federal net deferred tax assets since it is now more likely than not that the assets will be realized. As of June 30, 2018, the Company has $229.8 million of valuation allowance recorded on US deferred tax assets, primarily net operating losses and tax credits subject to certain ownership change limitations on their use.

The Company is actively marketing the HPC business and expects to consummate a sale prior to December 31, 2018. If the portion of the purchase price allocated to the US is sufficient, there is a reasonable possibility that the Company could release valuation allowance of $40.0 million of federal net operating losses currently subject to certain limits, and additional valuation allowance on US state net operating losses. The Company does not have sufficient certainty around the purchase price or the amount that would be allocated to the US to conclude that utilization of these net operating losses is more likely than not.

During the three month period ended March 31, 2018, the Company released $4.9 million of valuation allowance against its U.S. federal and state capital losses as a result of the announced sale of the GBL business to Energizer. During the nine month period ended June 30, 2018, the Company also released $2.7 million of valuation allowance against its U.S. state net operating loss deferred tax assets since the projected US tax gain on the sale makes it more likely than not that the additional tax benefits will be realized.

As of June 30, 2018, the Company has recorded $38.7 million of valuation allowance against its U.S. state net operating losses. It remains unclear which of the Tax Reform Act provisions will be adopted by each of the U.S. states. State conformity to the provisions of the Tax Reform Act could have a material impact on the valuation allowance recorded on U.S. state net operating losses.

The Tax Reform Act provided for a one-time deemed mandatory repatriation of post-1986 undistributed foreign subsidiary earnings and profits (“E&P”). The Company had an estimated $526.4 million of undistributed foreign E&P subject to the deemed mandatory repatriation and recognized a provisional $71.0 million of income tax expense in the Company’s net income from continuing operations for the nine month period ended June 30, 2018. The Company reduced the provisional tax expense by $6.9 million in the three month period ended June 30, 2018 to reflect additional information regarding earnings subject to repatriation tax. The mandatory repatriation tax is payable over 8 years, with the first payment due January 2019, therefore $5.7 million of the repatriation tax liability is classified as Other Current Liabilities and $65.3 million as Other Long-Term Liabilities on the Condensed Consolidated Statement of Financial Position as of June 30, 2018. The provisional tax expense for the mandatory repatriation is based on currently available information and additional information needs to be prepared, obtained and analyzed in order to determine the final amount, including further analysis of certain foreign exchange gains or losses, earnings and profits, foreign tax credits, and estimated cash and cash equivalents as of the measurement dates in the Tax Reform Act. Tax effects for changes to these items will be recorded in a subsequent quarter, as discrete adjustments to our income tax provision, once complete.

The Tax Reform Act provides for additional limitations on the deduction of business interest expense, effective with the Company’s Fiscal 2019 tax year. Unused interest deductions can be carried forward and may be used in future years to the extent the interest limitation is not exceeded in those periods. It is possible that a portion of the Company’s future U.S. interest expense could be nondeductible and impact the Company’s effective tax rate.

The Tax Reform Act also contains additional limits on deducting compensation, including performance-based compensation, in excess of $1 million paid to certain executive officers for any fiscal year, effective with the Company’s Fiscal 2019 tax year. The Company’s future compensation payments will be subject to these limits, which could impact the Company’s effective tax rate.

The Company continues to review the anticipated impacts of the global intangible low taxed income (“GILTI”) and base erosion anti-abuse tax (“BEAT”) on the Company, which are not effective until fiscal year 2019. The Company has not recorded any impact associated with either GILTI or BEAT in the tax rate for the nine month period ended June 30, 2018. The FASB allows an accounting policy election of either recognizing deferred taxes for temporary differences expected to reverse as GILTI in future years or treating such taxes as a current-period expense when incurred. Due to the complexity of calculating GILTI under the new law, we have not determined which method we will apply.

In response to the enactment of the Tax Reform Act, the SEC staff issued Staff Accounting Bulletin No. 118 (“SAB 118”) to address the application of U.S. GAAP in situations when a registrant does not have the necessary information available, prepared, or analyzed (including computations) in reasonable detail to complete the accounting for certain income tax effects of the Tax Reform Act. SAB 118 allows registrants to record provisional amounts during a one year measurement period in a manner similar to accounting for business combinations. The Company has recognized the provisional tax impacts related to deemed repatriated earnings and the revaluation of deferred tax assets and liabilities and included these amounts in its consolidated financial statements for the nine month period ended June 30, 2018. The ultimate impact may differ from these provisional amounts, possibly materially, due to, among other things, additional analysis, changes in interpretations and assumptions the Company has made, additional regulatory guidance that may be issued, and actions the Company may take as a result of the Tax Reform Act.