NOTE 12: INCOME TAXES

The effective income tax rates on income from continuing operations were 14.6% and 91.2% for the third quarter and first nine months of fiscal year 2018, respectively, compared to 16.8% and 6.7% for the third quarter and first nine months of fiscal year 2017, respectively. A tax expense special item of $101.2 million was recorded in the second quarter of fiscal year 2018 related to the impact of the Tax Act, which was enacted into law on December 22, 2017. A tax benefit special item of $19.7 million was recorded in the second quarter of fiscal year 2017 for settlement costs of various regulatory authority litigation. The effective tax rates on income from continuing operations excluding special items were 14.9% and 19.5% for the first nine months of fiscal years 2018 and 2017, respectively. This decrease reflects the lower U.S. tax rate resulting from the Tax Act, partially offset by a decrease in the percentage of earnings from foreign operations, which are taxed at lower rates than domestic earnings.

Four of Adtalem’s operating units, AUC, which operates in St. Maarten, RUSM, which operates in Dominica, RUSVM, which operates in St. Kitts, and Adtalem Brazil, which operates in Brazil, all benefit from local tax incentives. AUC’s effective tax rate reflects benefits derived from investment incentives. RUSM and RUSVM each have agreements with their respective domestic governments that exempt them from local income taxation. Both of these agreements have been extended to provide, in the case of RUSM, an indefinite period of exemption and, in the case of RUSVM, exemption until 2037. Adtalem Brazil’s effective tax rate reflects benefits derived from its participation in PROUNI, a Brazilian program for providing scholarships to a portion of its undergraduate students.

Prior to enactment of the Tax Act, Adtalem did not record a U.S. federal or state tax provision for the undistributed earnings of its international subsidiaries. As a result of the Tax Act, Adtalem has revised its prior intent to indefinitely reinvest accumulated undistributed earnings and profits in foreign operations, and now only intends to maintain this assertion with respect to accumulated and future earnings in Brazil. As of March 31, 2018, the cumulative undistributed earnings attributable to operations in Brazil was approximately $91 million.

Adtalem’s effective tax rate for the first nine months of fiscal year 2018 is impacted by the Tax Act. Income tax effects resulting from changes in tax laws are required to be accounted for in the period in which the law is enacted, and the effects are recorded as a component of provision for income taxes from continuing operations. As a result, a provision for income tax resulting from the enactment of the Tax Act was recorded in the second quarter of fiscal year 2018.

The Tax Act includes significant changes to the U.S. corporate income tax system, which reduces the U.S. federal corporate tax rate from 35.0% to 21.0% as of January 1, 2018; shifts to a modified territorial tax regime, which requires companies to pay a transition tax on earnings of certain foreign subsidiaries that were previously tax deferred; and creates new taxes on certain foreign-sourced earnings. The decrease in the U.S. federal corporate tax rate from 35.0% to 21.0% results in a blended statutory tax rate of 28.1% for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2018. The new taxes for certain foreign-sourced earnings under the Tax Act are effective for Adtalem after the fiscal year ending June 30, 2018.

The tax expense recorded in the second quarter of fiscal year 2018 upon enactment of the Tax Act included $96.3 million for the one-time transition tax on the deemed repatriation of foreign earnings, payable over eight years; $2.5 million to record the impact of the reduction in tax rates on our net deferred tax asset position; and $2.7 million for state income and foreign withholding taxes on undistributed foreign earnings that are no longer intended to be indefinitely reinvested in foreign operations, partially offset by $0.3 million to reduce tax expense recorded in the first quarter of fiscal year 2018 for the reduction in the U.S. tax rate. As of March 31, 2018, Adtalem has not fully completed its accounting for the tax effects of the enactment of the Tax Act. We are still evaluating various impacts of the enacted legislation and these impacts may materially differ from the estimated impacts recognized in the second quarter of fiscal year 2018 due to future treasury regulations, tax law technical corrections, and other potential guidance, notices, rulings, refined computations and actions we may take as a result of the tax legislation, and other items. The SEC has issued rules that allow for a measurement period of up to one year after the enactment date of the Tax Act to finalize the recording of the related tax impacts.

The Tax Act also includes provisions for Global Intangible Low-Taxed Income (“GILTI”) wherein taxes on foreign income are imposed in excess of a deemed return on tangible assets of foreign corporations. This income will effectively be taxed in general at a 10.5% tax rate. Adtalem has not completed its analysis on the potential impact to its deferred tax assets and liabilities, or whether to (i) account for GILTI as a component of tax expense in the period in which Adtalem is subject to the rules (the “period cost method”), or (ii) account for GILTI in Adtalem’s measurement of deferred taxes (the “deferred method”).