12.	INCOME TAXES

The U.S. Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (the “TCJA”) was signed into law on December 22, 2017. The TCJA included a number of changes to the U.S. corporate income tax including a reduction of the corporate income tax rate from 35% to 21% for tax years beginning after December 31, 2017. For fiscal 2018 the Company’s effective federal tax rate is 21%. For fiscal 2017 the Company used a blended effective tax rate of 33.7% which represented the prorated percentage from the TCJA’s January 1, 2018 effective date and the Company’s February 3, 2018 fiscal year-end.

Accounting Standards Codification (“ASC”) Topic 740, Income Taxes, requires that a valuation allowance be recorded to reduce deferred tax assets when it is more likely than not that the tax benefit of the deferred tax assets will not be realized. In situations where a three-year cumulative loss condition exists, accounting standards limit the ability to consider projections of future results as positive evidence to assess the realizability of deferred tax assets. In fiscal 2016 the Company’s financial results reflected a three-year cumulative loss. Consequently, in fiscal 2016 the Company recorded a non-cash charge as a valuation allowance against substantially all of its deferred tax assets. Three-year cumulative losses have continued in fiscal 2017 and fiscal 2018, consequently the Company continues to record a valuation allowance against its deferred tax assets.