13. Income Taxes

Our provision for income tax expense (benefit) is comprised of the following:

Because our eco-travel subsidiary is not part of the consolidated tax group, the provision includes Federal taxes associated with its income. The state provision consists of the taxes due for subsidiaries of Gaiam which file taxes on a separate basis, and are not able to utilize combined group net operating losses.

The components of our income taxes consisted of the following:

Variations from the federal statutory rate are as follows:

Deferred income taxes reflect net tax effects of temporary differences between the carrying amounts of assets and liabilities for financial reporting purposes and the amounts used for income tax purposes. The components of the net accumulated deferred income tax assets as of December 31, 2014 and 2013 are as follows:

As of December 31, 2014, our gross net operating losses were $69.0 million and $35.2 million for federal and state, respectively. The sources of income (loss) before income taxes are as follows:

Income tax benefit for 2012 includes $6.0 million due to the reducing of a deferred tax liability related to the carrying value of our equity method investment in RGSE and the reduction of the carrying value of our loans to RGSE. See Note 3. Related Party Transactions.

Certain of our subsidiaries, namely those for which we own less than 80% of their shares and voting rights and/or are foreign entities, file tax returns separately from Gaiam’s consolidated tax group. At December 31, 2014, we had made a provision for U.S. federal and state income taxes on approximately $0.3 million of undistributed foreign earnings, which are not expected to remain outside of the U.S. indefinitely. Deferred tax liabilities have been established for future taxes on distribution of foreign earnings in the form of dividends or otherwise, in order to derive, for financial statement purposes, the U.S. income taxes (net of tax on foreign tax credits), state income taxes, and withholding taxes payable to the various foreign countries.

Periodically, we perform assessments of the realization of our net deferred tax assets considering all available evidence, both positive and negative. On the basis of this assessment, we recorded a charge of $23.2 million to income tax expense to record a full valuation allowance against our deferred tax assets as of December 31, 2013. A significant piece of evidence evaluated was the cumulative loss incurred over the three-year period ended December 31, 2013. Because the valuation allowance will remain in place until we return to profitability, we did not record any tax benefit in 2014 associated with our net loss or other deferred tax assets. We continue to be optimistic about our future, and expect to return to operating profitability. When that happens, we expect to reverse the valuation allowance and record the related tax benefit for future use of our net operating loss carryforwards we expect to realize.

Based on RGSE’s establishment of a valuation allowance for all its net deferred tax assets at December 31, 2012, we established a valuation allowance, by charging loss from equity method investment, for our entire $1.6 million deferred tax asset related to our Tax Sharing Agreement with RGSE. See Note 3. Related Party Transactions. We concluded that no other changes to our existing valuation allowances were necessary. We expect our net deferred tax assets, less the valuation allowances, at December 31, 2014 to be fully recoverable through the reversal of taxable temporary differences and normal business activities in future years.

We realized $1.3 million in tax benefits recorded to additional paid-in capital as a result of the exercise of stock options for the year ended December 31, 2014. We did not realize any tax deductions associated with stock exercises in 2014. We realized $0.5 million in tax deductions and $0.7 million in tax benefits recorded to additional paid-in capital as a result of the exercise of stock options for the year ended December 31, 2013. We recognize the tax benefit from an uncertain tax position only if it is more likely than not that the tax position will be sustained on examination by the taxing authorities, based on the technical merits of the position. We measure the tax benefits recognized in the consolidated financial statements from such a position based on the largest benefit that has a greater than 50% likelihood of being realized upon ultimate resolution. The application of income tax law is inherently complex. Laws and regulations in this area are voluminous and are often ambiguous. As such, we are required to make many subjective assumptions and judgments regarding our income tax exposures. Interpretations of and guidance surrounding income tax law and regulations change over time and may result in changes to our subjective assumptions and judgments which can materially affect amounts recognized in our consolidated balance sheets and consolidated statements of operations. The result of our assessment of our uncertain tax positions did not have a material impact on our consolidated financial statements. Our federal and state tax returns for all years after 2010 are subject to future examination by tax authorities for all our tax jurisdictions. We recognize interest and penalties related to income tax matters in interest and other income (expense) and corporate, general and administration expenses, respectively.