11. Taxes

The breakdown of tax expenses by type is shown in the table below:

The deferred tax assets and liabilities were allocated to the items in the statements of financial position as shown in the table below:

Of the total tax loss carryforwards of €17 million (previous year: €30 million), an amount of €16 million (previous year: €22 million) is expected to be usable within a foreseeable period. The decrease in loss carryforwards was mainly due to the use of existing loss carryforwards in the reporting year and tax reassessments for prior years. Deferred tax assets of €4 million (previous year: €6 million) were recognized for the amount of loss carryforwards expected to be usable.

The use of €1 million (previous year: €8 million) of tax loss carryforwards was subject to legal or economic restrictions with regard to its usability. Consequently, no deferred tax assets were recognized for this amount.

No material tax credits were recorded in either the reporting year or the prior year.

Unusable tax loss carryforwards will expire as shown in the table below:

In 2018, subsidiaries that reported losses for the reporting year or the previous year recognized net deferred tax assets totaling €7 million (previous year: €5 million) from temporary differences and tax loss carryforwards. These assets were considered to be unimpaired because the companies concerned were expected to generate taxable income in the future.

In the reporting year, deferred tax liabilities of €21 million (previous year: €18 million) were recognized for planned dividend distributions by subsidiaries. No deferred tax liabilities were recognized for temporary differences of €71 million (previous year: €46 million) relating to shares in subsidiaries, as it is unlikely that these temporary differences will reverse in the foreseeable future.

The reported tax expense of €647 million (previous year: €641 million) for 2018 was €56 million higher (previous year: difference of €83 million) than the expected tax expense of €591 million (previous year: €724 million) that would have resulted from applying an expected weighted average tax rate to the pre-tax income of the Covestro Group. This average rate was derived from the expected tax rates of the individual Group companies and amounted to 23.9% in 2018 (previous year: 27.2%). The effective tax rate was 26.1% (previous year: 24.1%).

The reconciliation of expected to actual income tax expense and of the expected to the effective tax rate for the Covestro Group is shown in the following table: