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Income Taxes
9 Months Ended
Aug. 31, 2018
Income Tax Disclosure [Abstract]  
Income Taxes
 INCOME TAXES
On December 22, 2017, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (the “Tax Act”) was enacted into law, which significantly changes existing U.S. tax law and includes many provisions applicable to us, such as reducing the U.S. federal statutory tax rate, imposing a one-time transition tax on deemed repatriation of deferred foreign income, and adopting a territorial tax system. The Tax Act reduced the U.S. federal statutory tax rate from 35% to 21% effective January 1, 2018. For fiscal 2018, our blended U.S. federal statutory tax rate is 22.2%. This is the result of using the tax rate of 35% for the first month of fiscal 2018 and the reduced tax rate of 21% for the remaining eleven months of fiscal 2018. The Tax Act also required us to incur a one-time transition tax on deferred foreign income not previously subject to U.S. income tax at a rate of 15.5% for foreign cash and certain other net current assets, and 8% on the remaining income, in each case reduced by certain foreign tax credits. The Tax Act also includes a provision to tax global intangible low-taxed income of foreign subsidiaries, a special tax deduction for foreign-derived intangible income, and a base erosion anti-abuse tax measure that may tax certain payments between a U.S. corporation and its subsidiaries. These additional provisions of the Tax Act will be effective for us beginning December 1, 2018.
The Tax Act was effective in the first quarter of our fiscal 2018. As of August 31, 2018, we have not completed our accounting for the tax effects of the Tax Act. During the quarter, we recorded an adjustment to the provisional tax charge based on reasonable estimates for those tax effects using the current available information and technical guidance on the interpretations of the Tax Act. In order to complete our accounting for the impact of the Tax Act, we continue to obtain, analyze and interpret additional guidance as such guidance becomes available from the U.S. Treasury Department, the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”), state taxing jurisdictions, the FASB, and other standard-setting and regulatory bodies. New guidance or interpretations may materially impact our provision for income taxes in future periods. Additional information that is needed to complete the analysis but is currently unavailable includes, but is not limited to, the amount of earnings of certain subsidiaries as well as the amount of foreign taxes paid on such earnings for our fiscal 2018, the final determination of certain net deferred tax assets subject to remeasurement and when the related temporary differences will be settled or realized, and the tax treatment of such provisions of the Tax Act by various state tax authorities. In addition, we do not currently have sufficient information and guidance to determine the impact of certain changes to the taxation of our foreign earnings that will become effective for us in fiscal 2019. The provisional accounting impacts may change in the subsequent reporting period when our accounting analysis is finalized, as permitted by SEC Staff Accounting Bulletin 118, Income Tax Accounting Implications of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
As a result of the reduction in the federal corporate tax rate, we remeasured our deferred taxes as of the date of enactment of the Tax Act and recorded a provisional tax charge of $10 million based on the tax rate that is expected to apply when such deferred taxes are settled or realized in future periods. We have not completed our accounting for the measurement of deferred taxes. To calculate the remeasurement of deferred taxes, we estimated when the existing deferred taxes will be settled or realized. The remeasurement of deferred taxes included in our financial statements will be subject to further revisions if our current estimates are different from our actual future operating results.
As part of the adoption of a new territorial tax system we recorded a provisional transition tax expense of $118 million on deferred foreign earnings, which was comprised of $86 million for fiscal 2018 plus other ancillary effects recorded in the first fiscal quarter, long-term income taxes payable of $533 million, and a reduction in our deferred tax liability of $415 million. As a result of a change to our corporate tax structure that provided us the ability to deduct more expenses against our earnings in the U.S., we updated our Tax Act calculation during the three months ended June 1, 2018. This included an additional provisional transition tax expense of $28 million on deferred foreign earnings, a decrease of deferred tax assets by $72 million which also included utilization of credits that we estimate will be available to reduce the transition tax, and a reduction of long-term income tax payable by $44 million. As a result of technical guidance updates on the interpretations of the Tax Act available in the quarter, we updated our Tax Act calculation during the three months ended August 31, 2018. The application of this guidance resulted in an additional net provisional tax expense of $24 million, a decrease of net deferred tax assets by $25 million, an increase in unrecognized tax benefits included in the long-term income tax payable of $69 million, a reduction of the short-term income taxes payable of $7 million, and a reduction to the long-term income tax payable of $62 million. To calculate the transition tax, we estimated our deferred foreign income for fiscal 2018 because the information needed to complete the calculation will not be known until our taxable income is known. In addition, U.S. and foreign audit settlements may significantly impact the estimated transition tax. The impact of the U.S. and foreign audits on the transition tax will be known as the audits are concluded. We intend to elect to pay the federal transition tax over a period of eight years as permitted by the Tax Act. As a result, in the second quarter of fiscal 2018, we reclassified $39 million from long-term income taxes payable to short-term income taxes payable for the first installment payment due in fiscal 2019. During the three months ended August 31, 2018, we reclassified $5 million from short-term income taxes payable to long-term income taxes payable as a result of the updated technical guidance on the interpretations of the Tax Act.
Certain international provisions introduced in the Tax Act will be effective for us in fiscal 2019. We need additional information to complete our analysis on whether to adopt an accounting policy to account for the tax effects of these provisions in the period that it is subject to such tax, or to provide deferred taxes for book and tax basis differences that upon reversal may be subject to these taxes. Accordingly, we have not recorded any tax with respect to these provisions in the nine months ended August 31, 2018. We will make an accounting policy election and complete the required accounting no later than the first quarter of fiscal 2019.