Smith & Nephew announces updated guidance regarding its expected corporate tax rate following legislative changes to the tax environment in the United States. US federal corporate income tax rate from 35% to 21% which came into effect on 1 January 2018. As a result of this change, from 2018 Smith & Nephew now expects a corporate tax rate on trading results in the range 20% to 21% for the medium term, barring any changes to tax legislation or other one-off items. This is a reduction of 4 to 5 percentage points on previous guidance of around 25%. The one-time effects of US tax reform in 2017, including the revaluation of certain deferred tax balances, are not expected to be material and will be taken outside trading results. Separately, they expect the full year tax rate on 2017 trading results to be lower than their previous guidance of around 22%. This is mainly due to the release of provisions, which are one-off in nature, as they conclude and revise open tax issues, including the US tax audit as reported at the half year.