Income Taxes

9 Months Ended

Jun. 30, 2020

Income Tax Disclosure [Abstract]

Income Taxes

Income Taxes

Income Tax Provision

The Company's income tax provision for quarterly interim periods is based on an estimated annual effective income tax rate calculated separately from the effect of significant, infrequent, or unusual items. The total income tax provision, including discontinued operations, was a tax expense of $5.0 million and $8.9 million for the three and nine months ended June 30, 2020, respectively, compared to an income tax benefit of $2.2 million and $44.3 million for the three and nine months ended June 30, 2019, respectively. Income tax expense for the nine months ended June 30, 2020 was substantially driven by (1) income from continuing operations, partially offset by (2) the completion of work necessary to claim an additional $0.8 million in tax credits related to prior fiscal years, and (3) the discrete impact related to stock-based compensation expense as a result of current period activity. Income tax benefit for the nine months ended June 30, 2019 was primarily driven by (1) $148.6 million of book impairments on our land inventory assets, and (2) the completion of work necessary to claim an additional $9.8 million in tax credits related to prior fiscal years, partially offset by (3) the discrete impact related to our stock-based compensation expense.

Deferred Tax Assets and Liabilities

As of December 31, 2019, the net deferred tax asset was comprised of various tax attributes that included $4.6 million of minimum tax credit carryforwards. Beginning in our fiscal 2019, the Company started making cash refund claims for significant portions of these credits due to the elimination of the alternative minimum tax in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. On March 27, 2020, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act was signed into law. The CARES Act provides companies with the ability to make a refund claim for their entire minimum tax carryforward as early as their 2018 tax return. As a result, in the quarter-ended March 31, 2020, we reduced our deferred tax asset by the remaining $4.6 million of minimum tax credits and increased our tax receivable for the refund we expect to receive with the filing of our fiscal 2019 tax return.

The Company continues to evaluate its deferred tax assets each period to determine if a valuation allowance is required based on whether it is more likely than not that some portion of these deferred tax assets will not be realized. As of June 30, 2020, management concluded that it is more likely than not that a substantial portion of our deferred tax assets will be realized. As part of our analysis, we considered both positive and negative factors that impact profitability and whether those factors would lead to a change in the estimate of our deferred tax assets that may be realized in the future. As we continue to monitor the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on our business, any sustained or prolonged reductions in future earnings periods may change our conclusions on whether we are more likely than not to realize portions of our deferred tax assets. At this time, our conclusions on the valuation allowance and Internal Revenue Code Section 382 limitations related to our deferred tax assets remain consistent with the determinations we made during the period ended September 30, 2019, and such conclusions are based on similar company specific and industry factors to those discussed in Note 13 to the audited consolidated financial statements within our 2019 Annual Report.