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Income Taxes
3 Months Ended
Mar. 31, 2016
Income Tax Disclosure [Abstract]  
Income Taxes
Income Taxes
In the first quarter of 2016, we recorded income tax expense of approximately $30 million. The income tax expense for the three months reflects taxes from federal, foreign, state and local jurisdictions. Our effective tax rate was 30.9%. Our effective tax rate was lower than the U.S. statutory rate primarily because of earnings realized in countries that had lower statutory tax rates and our equity method income. Our effective tax rate in the future will depend on the portion of our profits earned within and outside the United States.
As of March 31, 2016, we had federal net operating loss, or NOL, carryforwards of approximately $1.682 billion that are available to offset future federal taxable income and will expire in the years 2026 through 2032, none of which are subject to Internal Revenue Code limitations under Section 382. In addition, as of that date, we had federal AMT credit carryforwards of approximately $40 million that are available to reduce future regular federal income taxes over an indefinite period. In order to fully realize these U.S. federal net deferred tax assets, taxable income of approximately $1.797 billion would need to be generated during the period before their expiration.
As of March 31, 2016, we had a gross deferred tax asset related to our state NOLs and tax credit carryforwards of $228 million, of which $27 million will expire in 2016. The remainder will expire if unused in years 2017 through 2035. We also had NOL and tax credit carryforwards in various foreign jurisdictions in the amount of $1 million as of March 31, 2016, against which we have maintained a valuation allowance.
A reduction of the carrying amounts of deferred tax assets by a valuation allowance is required if, based on all available evidence, it is more likely than not that such assets will not be realized. The need to establish valuation allowances for deferred tax assets is assessed at each reporting date. In assessing the requirement for, and amount of, a valuation allowance in accordance with the more-likely-than-not standard, we give appropriate consideration to all positive and negative evidence related to the realization of the deferred tax assets. This assessment considers, among other matters, the nature, frequency and severity of current and cumulative losses, forecasts of future profitability, the duration of statutory carryforward periods, our experience with operating loss and tax credit carryforwards not expiring unused and tax planning strategies.
Based on our evaluation, during the first three months of 2016, we made no adjustments to the valuation allowance against our deferred tax assets of $75 million, which relates to certain net operating losses that we anticipate will not be used prior to their expiration.
The Internal Revenue Code imposes limitations on a corporation’s ability to utilize NOLs if it experiences an “ownership change” which can result from transactions increasing the ownership of certain stockholders in the stock of a corporation by more than 50 percentage points over a three-year period. If we were to experience an ownership change, utilization of our NOLs would be subject to an annual limitation that may be carried over to later years within the allowed NOL carryforward period. Over the entire carryforward period, we may not be able to use all our NOLs due to the aforementioned annual limitation. If an ownership change had occurred as of March 31, 2016, our annual U.S. federal NOL utilization would have been limited to approximately $96 million per year.