Derivatives and Hedging Activities

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2016

Notes To Financial Statements [Abstract]

Derivatives and Hedging Activities

Derivatives and Hedging Activities

Risk Management Objective of Using Derivatives

We are exposed to certain risks arising from both our business operations and economic conditions. We principally manage our exposures to a wide variety of business and operational risks through management of our core business activities. We manage economic risks, including interest rate, liquidity and credit risk, primarily by managing the amount, sources and duration of our debt funding and the use of derivative financial instruments. Specifically, we enter into derivative financial instruments to manage exposures that arise from business activities that result in the payment of future contractual and forecasted cash amounts, principally related to our borrowings, the value of which are determined by changing interest rates, related cash flows and other factors.

Cash Flow Hedges of Interest Rate Risk

Our objectives in using interest rate derivatives are to add stability to interest expense and to manage our exposure to interest rate movements. To accomplish these objectives, we use interest rate swaps and interest rate caps as part of our interest rate risk management strategy. Interest rate swaps designated as cash flow hedges involve the receipt of variable amounts from a counterparty in exchange for us making fixed-rate payments over the life of the agreements without exchange of the underlying notional amount. Interest rate caps designated as cash flow hedges involve the receipt of variable amounts from a counterparty if interest rates rise above the strike rate on the contract in exchange for an up-front premium.

The effective portion of changes in the fair value of derivatives designated and that qualify as cash flow hedges is recorded in accumulated other comprehensive income and is subsequently reclassified into earnings in the period that the hedged forecasted transaction affects earnings. During the three months ended March 31, 2016 and 2015, such derivatives were used to hedge the variable cash flows associated with existing variable-rate debt and forecasted issuances of fixed-rate debt.  The ineffective portion of the change in fair value of the derivatives is recognized directly in earnings.

During the three months ended March 31, 2016 and 2015, we recorded ineffectiveness of $43,000 (increase to interest expense) and $60,000 (increase to interest expense), respectively, mainly attributable to a mismatch in the underlying indices of the derivatives and the hedged interest payments made on our variable-rate debt and due to the designation of acquired interest rate swaps with a non-zero fair value at inception.

Amounts reported in "Accumulated other comprehensive income" related to derivatives designated as qualifying cash flow hedges will be reclassified to interest expense as interest payments are made on our variable-rate or fixed-rate debt. During the next twelve months, we estimate that an additional $3.6 million will be reclassified to earnings as an increase to Interest expense, which primarily represents the difference between our fixed interest rate swap payments and the projected variable interest rate swap payments.

As of March 31, 2016, we had the following outstanding interest rate derivatives that were designated as cash flow hedges of interest rate risk:

Interest Rate Derivative	Number of Instruments	Notional Amount
Interest Rate Caps	3	$	75,000,000
Interest Rate Swaps	7	$	550,000,000

Tabular Disclosure of the Effect of Derivative Instruments on the Statements of Operations

The table below presents the effect of our derivative financial instruments on the Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operations for the three months ended March 31, 2016 and 2015.

Effect of Derivative Instruments on the Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operations for the

Three months ended March 31, 2016 and 2015 (dollars in thousands)

Derivatives in Cash Flow Hedging Relationships	Gain or (Loss) Recognized in  OCI on Derivative  (Effective Portion)						Gain or (Loss) Reclassified from Accumulated  OCI into Interest Expense  (Effective Portion)						Gain or (Loss) Recognized in Interest Expense (Ineffective Portion and Amount Excluded from Effectiveness Testing)
Three months ended March 31,	2016			2015			2016			2015			2016			2015
Interest rate contracts	$	(3,705	)	$	(4,347	)	$	(1,186	)	$	(2,192	)	$	(43	)	$	(60	)
Derivatives Not Designated as Hedging Instruments
Three months ended March 31,													2016			2015
Interest rate contracts													$	—		$	(3	)

Credit-Risk-Related Contingent Features

As of March 31, 2016, derivatives that were in a net liability position and subject to credit-risk-related contingent features had a termination value of $13.0 million, which includes accrued interest but excludes any adjustment for nonperformance risk. These derivatives had a fair value, gross of asset positions, of $12.3 million at March 31, 2016.

Certain of our derivative contracts contain a provision where we could be declared in default on our derivative obligations if repayment of the underlying indebtedness is accelerated by the lender due to our default on the indebtedness. As of March 31, 2016, we had not breached the provisions of these agreements. If we had breached these provisions, we could have been required to settle our obligations under the agreements at the termination value of $13.0 million.

Although our derivative contracts are subject to master netting arrangements, which serve as credit mitigants to both us and our counterparties under certain situations, we do not net our derivative fair values or any existing rights or obligations to cash collateral on the Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheets.

We did not have any asset or liability derivative balances that were offsetting that would have resulted in reported net derivative balances differing from the recorded gross amount of derivative assets of $2,000 and $6,000 as of March 31, 2016 and December 31, 2015, respectively, in addition to gross recorded derivative liabilities of $12.3 million and $10.4 million as of March 31, 2016 and December 31, 2015, respectively.

Other Comprehensive Income

MAA's other comprehensive income consists entirely of gains and losses attributable to the effective portion of our cash flow hedges. The chart below shows the change in the balance for the three months ended March 31, 2016 and 2015 (dollars in thousands):

Changes in Accumulated Other Comprehensive Income by Component	Affected Line Item in the Consolidated Statements Of Operations
		Gains and Losses on Cash Flow Hedges
For the three months ended March 31,		2016			2015
Beginning balance		$	(1,589	)	$	(412	)
Other comprehensive income (loss) before reclassifications		(3,705		)	(4,347		)
Amounts reclassified from accumulated other comprehensive income (interest rate contracts)	Interest expense	1,186			2,192
Net current-period other comprehensive loss (income) attributable to noncontrolling interest		132			114
Net current-period other comprehensive (loss) income attributable to MAA		(2,387		)	(2,041		)
Ending balance		$	(3,976	)	$	(2,453	)

See also discussions in Note 8 (Fair Value Disclosure of Financial Instruments) to the Condensed Consolidated Financial Statements.