HeidelbergCement released a statement in response to the United States’ recent tax overhaul that reduced the federal corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent as well as changed the regulations regarding the utilization of loss carryforwards.
“As a consequence, especially deferred tax assets on losses and interest carried-forwards must be re-measured in the consolidated financial statement for 2017,” the company said. “Based on initial calculations and taking into account respective restructuring measures, we expect a negative balance sheet effect of in total about 200 million euros ($240 million) that leads to a corresponding impact on Group net profit in 2017. The exact amount can only be computed during preparation of the 2017 group financial statements. This re-measurement of the deferred tax assets is a one-time effect that is not cash-effective and has no impact on earnings before tax or cash flow in 2017.”
The outlook for 2017 group share of profit before one-time effects remains unchanged.
The write-down also has no impact on the company’s communicated, progressive dividend policy.
Starting in 2019, HeidelbergCement said that it assumes the significant reduction of the effective tax rate in the United States will have a positive effect on net profit and cashflow.
“Again, the overall effect cannot be quantified with reasonable certainty at this point in time as, among others, implementation rules from the U.S. tax authorities regarding the new legislative bill are still pending,” the company concluded.
