IBM's Cash Repatriation Strategy

I believe the real thing to look at is the 5.5 billion charge taken in 4th q. What does that equate to. 5.5/.15 repatriation charge = 36.666 billion. Now IBM always had access to the 36 billion of cash, and said as much during the CFO call just after earnings release.

The CFO also said due to access of the 36 billion, IBM’s strategy has remained steady, and continues unabated. So what does the 4th q charge really mean going forward. I believe it really means, that IBM has big 2018 plans to curb their legacy costs “mostly” in the USA.

The legacy costs in Europe, and OZ are also a problem, but they are less of a concern for IBM as the “intangibles” (retirement, health care, severance, and deferred expenses) are already accounted for via the local government policy’s vs the USA . So what do I believe is going to happen???

I believe IBM will on shore the 36 billion, and take an expense to make the legacy costs zero out. (Eg if you are a company purchasing, or acquiring IBM legacy, your acquisition of the assets zero’s out the intangibles). Just look at Global Foundries and IBM’s spin off to them. IBM took a very large charge to make BTV and EF go away. (Eg the intangibles were on the books for a whole lot).

So, now let’s look at IBM’s current landscape. They want to “milk” the legacy mostly via IP, but no one will pay them for that due to the intangible charges. If IBM makes the intangibles go away, they build a model where low margin companies can acquire IBM services assets at the cost of “new hires”.

It’s quite a win / win for IBM as they really do wish to milk that Legacy investment via IP. NET NET this seems to dovetail nicely with the GTS/GBS combination. Harvest out the “younger/ strategic investment skills” into IBM services, and spin off the “older / more experienced” legacy skills to a new endeavor (the intangible zeroing out make this quite attractive for any company looking at IBM experienced folks to hire, as no baggage comes along with the hire)

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Greetings. I never meant to imply that 36 billion was coming back into the country as I did say, IBM always had access to the cash. (If I did imply that, I apologise for being mis-leading). What I was trying to show was how the CFO at IBM would look at the tax implications. NET NET there is a reason IBM took the charge all at once vs taking it over 8 years as allowed by the new tax law. If history is a guide, IBM tends to take their medicine all at once to clear up the books, just prior to a large corporate change (eg selling of System x, selling of chip division, selling of PC division). Again my apologies if I was mis-leading

Your math is a bit over-simplistic. IBM does not have 36B in cash. The 5.5B charge includes a tax on accumulated foreign profits along with revaluation of deferred tax assets and liabilities. In short, IBM's collection of unused tax credits is now worth less than it used to be. As for the CFO's comment on access to cash, it's quite true : IBM has been using its abroad cash for shares buyback thanks to IBM organisations established for instance in the Netherlands.

not sure Aus would be a problem they used to have 14k people in the 2012 era now down to below 5k and cutting again this week. cuts every year, people are fleeing in droves, the rest are just looking over their shoulders. horrible place to work and getting worse.

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IBM's Cash Repatriation Strategy

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