The Company is exposed to certain risks during the normal course of its business arising from adverse changes in interest rates. The Company selectively uses derivative financial instruments (“derivatives”), including interest rate swaps, to manage interest rate risk. The Company does not hold or issue derivative instruments for speculative purposes. Fluctuations in interest rates can be volatile, and the Company’s risk management activities do not totally eliminate these risks. Consequently, these fluctuations could have a significant effect on the Company’s financial results.

The Company’s exposure to interest rate risk results primarily from its variable rate borrowings. On May 9, 2018, the Company entered into variable to fixed interest rate swap agreements for a notional amount of $1,361.2 million to hedge a portion of the outstanding principal balance of its variable rate term loan debt.

As of December 31, 2019, the Company is the fixed rate payor on two interest rate swap contracts that effectively fix the LIBOR-based index used to determine the interest rates charged on the Company’s total long-term debt of $2,283.7 million, not including unamortized debt issuance costs and discounts. These contracts fix approximately 60% of the Company’s term loan variable rate exposure at 2.7% and have an expiration date of May 2021. These swap agreements qualify as hedging instruments and have been designated as cash flow hedges of forecasted LIBOR-based interest payments. As all of the critical terms of each of the derivative instruments matched the underlying terms of the hedged debt and related forecasted interest payments, these hedges were considered highly effective. Based on LIBOR-based swap yield curves as of December 31, 2019, the Company expects to reclassify losses of $14.7 million out of accumulated other comprehensive loss (“AOCL”) into earnings within the next 12 months.

The following table summarizes the notional amounts and fair values of the Company’s outstanding derivatives by risk category and instrument type within the consolidated balance sheets as of December 31, 2019 and 2018.

Losses recognized in the consolidated statements of operations for the year ended December 31, 2019 and 2018 total $6.2 million and $4.8 million, respectively.

Gains and losses on derivatives designated as cash flow hedges included in the consolidated statements of comprehensive income (loss) for the years ended December 31, 2019 and 2018 are shown in the table below.

(1)	Losses on derivatives reclassified from AOCI into income will be included in “Interest expense” in the consolidated statements of operations, the same income statement line item as the earnings effect of the hedged item.

(2)	The Company did not calculate tax expense associated with the derivative activity during the year ended December 31, 2018 due to the pre-tax net loss.

For the periods presented, all cash flows associated with derivatives are classified as operating cash flows in the consolidated statements of cash flows.