Derivative Financial Instruments

From time to time, CenturyLink, Inc. uses derivative financial instruments, primarily interest rate swaps, to manage our exposure to fluctuations in interest rates. Our primary objective in managing interest rate risk is to decrease the volatility of our earnings and cash flows affected by changes in the underlying rates. We have floating rate long-term debt (see Note 5—Long-Term Debt and Credit Facilities to our consolidated financial statements in Item 1 of Part I of this report). These obligations expose us to variability in interest payments due to changes in interest rates. If interest rates increase, interest expense increases. Conversely, if interest rates decrease, interest expense also decreases. We have designated our interest rate swap agreements as cash flow hedges. Swaps designated as cash flow hedges involve the receipt of variable-rate amounts from a counterparty in exchange for us making fixed-rate payments over the lives of the agreements without exchange of the underlying notional amount. The change in the fair value of the interest rate swap agreements is reflected in Accumulated Other Comprehensive Income (Loss) (“AOCI”) and is subsequently reclassified into earnings in the period that the hedged transaction affects earnings, due to the fact that the interest rate swap agreements qualify as effective cash flow hedges. We do not use derivative financial instruments for speculative purposes.

In February 2019, we entered into five variable-to-fixed interest rate swap agreements to hedge the interest payments on $2.5 billion notional amount of floating rate debt. The five interest rate swap agreements are with different counterparties; one for $700 million and the other four for $450 million each. The transactions were effective beginning March 31, 2019 and mature March 31, 2022. Under the terms of the interest rate swap transactions, we receive interest payments based on one month floating LIBOR terms and pay interest at the fixed rate of 2.48%. We evaluate the effectiveness of the hedges qualitatively on a quarterly basis.

CenturyLink, Inc. is exposed to credit related losses in the event of non-performance by counterparties. The counterparties to any of the financial derivatives we enter into are major institutions with investment grade credit ratings. We evaluate counterparty credit risk before entering into any hedge transaction and continue to closely monitor the financial market and the risk that our counterparties will default on their obligations. This credit risk is generally limited to the unrealized losses in such contracts, should any of these counterparties fail to perform as contracted.

Amounts accumulated in AOCI related to derivatives are indirectly recognized in earnings as periodic settlements occur throughout the term of the swaps, when the related interest payments are made on our variable-rate debt.

The table below presents the fair value of our derivative financial instruments as well as their classification on the consolidated balance sheets as follows (in millions):

The amount of losses recognized in AOCI consists of the following (in millions):



Derivatives designated as hedging instruments	2019
Cash flow hedging contracts
Three months ended March 31,	$	23

Amounts currently included in AOCI will be reflected as earnings prior to the settlement of these cash flow hedging contracts in 2022. We estimate that $2.3 million of net losses on the interest rate swaps (based on the estimated LIBOR curve as of March 31, 2019) will be reflected as earnings within the next twelve months. Our interest rate swap agreements designated as cash flow hedging contracts qualify as effective hedge relationships.

Liability Derivatives

March 31, 2019

Derivatives designated as

Balance Sheet Location

Fair Value

Cash flow hedging contracts

Other current and noncurrent liabilities