INCOME TAXES

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (the TCJA) was signed into law on December 22, 2017, with an effective date of January 1, 2018, for substantially all of the provisions. This comprehensive act includes significant reform of the current income tax code including changes in the calculation for business entities and a reduction in the corporate federal income tax rate from 35% to 21%. The specific provisions related to regulated public utilities in the TCJA generally allow for the continued deductibility of interest expense, the elimination of full expensing for tax purposes of certain property acquired after September 27, 2017, and the continuation of certain rate normalization requirements for accelerated depreciation benefits.

ASC Topic 740, Income Taxes, requires that the effects of changes in tax laws be recognized in the period in which the new law is enacted. It also requires deferred tax assets and liabilities to be measured at the enacted tax rate expected to apply when temporary differences are to be realized or settled. For the Company’s regulated entities, the changes in deferred taxes related to the regulated operations are recorded as either an offset to or creation of a regulatory asset or liability and may be subject to refund to customers in future periods. The changes in deferred taxes that are not associated with rate making (including all changes for the Company’s unregulated operations) are recorded as adjustments to deferred tax expense.

The Company has recorded TCJA impacts and reflected those amounts in the June 30, 2018, financial statements. The amounts recorded are based on information known and reasonable estimates used as of that date, but are subject to change based on a number of factors, including further actions of regulators. The items recorded include the impact of the federal income tax rate reduction and the revaluation of the deferred tax assets and liabilities. In the second quarter of fiscal 2018, the estimated amounts were adjusted to account for effects of the March MoPSC order, including the lower federal tax rate impact for the quarter and reductions in net deferred tax liabilities related to regulatory assets determined not to be recoverable and removed from rate base. In the third quarter of fiscal 2018, the MoPSC Amended Report and Order took effect and the estimated excess accumulated deferred income tax began to be returned to customers in rates. The amount being returned is estimated with a tracker established to defer the difference from the estimated amounts to the actual amounts once the actual amounts have been calculated. During the third quarter of fiscal 2018, excess accumulated deferred taxes of $1.9 were returned.

The total amounts recorded, before reduction for amounts returned to customers, for the nine months ended June 30, 2018, are presented in the table below.



	Spire			Spire Missouri			Spire Alabama
Adjustment to deferred tax assets	$	—		$	—		$	(60.8	)
Adjustment to deferred tax liabilities	(299.5		)	(268.2		)	—

Adjustment to deferred income tax expense	(69.4		)	(54.6		)	59.2

Adjustment to regulatory assets	(59.4		)	(61.0		)	1.6
Adjustment to regulatory liabilities	170.7			152.6			—

As indicated in Note 1, Summary of Significant Accounting Policies, the Company’s regulated operations accounting for income taxes is impacted by ASC 980, Regulated Operations. Reductions in deferred income tax balances due to the reduction in the corporate income tax rate will result in amounts previously collected from utility customers for these deferred taxes to be refundable to such customers, generally through reductions in future rates. The TCJA includes provisions that stipulate how these excess deferred taxes are to be passed back to customers for certain accelerated tax depreciation benefits. Potential refunds of other deferred taxes will be determined by state regulators.