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Income Taxes
3 Months Ended
Feb. 28, 2019
Income Tax Disclosure [Abstract]  
INCOME TAXES
INCOME TAXES
Income taxes for the three months ended February 28, 2019 included $17.6 million of discrete tax benefits consisting principally of the following: (i) $16.2 million of tax benefits associated with an intra-entity asset transfer that occurred during the quarter under the provisions of ASU No. 2016-16, which was adopted on December 1, 2018, and (ii) $1.6 million of excess tax benefits associated with share-based compensation.
Income taxes for the three months ended February 28, 2018 included $303.0 million of discrete tax benefits consisting of the following: (i) the $297.9 million net benefit associated with the U.S. Tax Act, described below, (ii) $3.4 million of excess tax benefits associated with share-based compensation, and (iii) $2.2 million related to the reversal of unrecognized tax benefits and related interest associated with the expiration of statutes of limitation in non-US jurisdictions, offset by a $0.5 million net detriment related to the revaluation of deferred tax assets related to legislation enacted in a non-US jurisdiction in our first quarter.
In December 2017, President Trump signed into law H.R. 1, “An Act to provide for reconciliation pursuant to titles II and V of the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2018” (this legislation was formerly called the “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act” and is referred to herein as the “U.S. Tax Act”). The U.S. Tax Act provided for significant changes in the U.S. Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended. Certain provisions of the U.S. Tax Act were effective during our fiscal year ended November 30, 2018 with all provisions of the U.S. Tax Act effective as of the beginning of our fiscal year beginning December 1, 2018. The U.S. Tax Act contains provisions with separate effective dates but is generally effective for taxable years beginning after December 31, 2017. The U.S. Tax Act creates a new requirement that certain income earned by foreign subsidiaries, known as GILTI, must be included in the gross income of the subsidiary's U.S. shareholder.  This provision of the U.S. Tax Act was effective for us for our fiscal year beginning December 1, 2018. The FASB allows an accounting policy election of either recognizing deferred taxes for temporary differences expected to reverse as GILTI in future years or recognizing such taxes as a current period expense when incurredWe have elected to treat GILTI as a current period expense when incurred.
The Securities and Exchange Commission issued Staff Accounting Bulletin No. 118 (SAB 118) on December 23, 2017. SAB 118 provided a one-year measurement period from a registrant’s reporting period that includes the U.S. Tax Act’s enactment date to allow registrants sufficient time to obtain, prepare and analyze information to complete the accounting required under ASC 740 Income Taxes. As more fully described in note 12 of notes to consolidated financial statements included in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended November 30, 2018, we recognized a $301.5 million income tax benefit, net, associated with the U.S. Tax Act during the year ended November 30, 2018. The net tax benefit related to the U.S. Tax Act was provisional and changed during the measurement period, which ended in the quarter ended November 30, 2018, as a result of, among other things, changes in interpretations and assumptions we made, guidance issued and other actions taken as a result of the U.S. Tax Act different from that previously assumed. Based upon estimates and judgments that we believed to be reasonable, we recognized a net benefit of $297.9 million during the three months ended February 28, 2018 related to the U.S. Tax Act, as described below.
Beginning on January 1, 2018, the U.S. Tax Act lowered the U.S. corporate income tax rate from 35% to 21% on our U.S. earnings from that date and beyond. As of February 28, 2018, we estimated that the revaluation of our U.S. deferred tax assets and liabilities to the 21% corporate tax rate reduced our net U.S. deferred income tax liability by $376.5 million and we reflected that amount as a reduction in our income tax expense for the three months ended February 28, 2018. The U.S. Tax Act imposed a one-time transition tax on post-1986 earnings of non-U.S. affiliates that had not been repatriated for purposes of U.S. federal income tax, with those earnings taxed at rates of 15.5% for earnings reflected by cash and cash equivalent items and 8% for other assets. As of February 28, 2018, we estimated this transition tax to be $72.3 million. In addition to this transition tax, we incurred additional foreign withholding taxes of $6.3 million associated with previously unremitted prior year earnings of certain foreign subsidiaries that were no longer considered indefinitely reinvested at January 1, 2018, which we recognized as a component of our income tax expense for the three months ended February 28, 2018.

Other than the discrete tax benefits mentioned previously and additions for current year tax positions, there were no significant changes to unrecognized tax benefits during the three months ended February 28, 2019.

As of February 28, 2019, we believe the reasonably possible total amount of unrecognized tax benefits that could increase or decrease in the next 12 months as a result of various statute expirations, audit closures, and/or tax settlements would not be material to our consolidated financial statements.