Corporations brought US$100.2 billion of overseas profits backto the United States in the first quarter, marking $876.8 billionthat has returned since Congress overhauled the international taxsystem and prodded companies to repatriate more.

The cash that has come back to the U.S. falls short of the $4trillion President Donald Trump said would return as aresult of the 2017 tax law. Investment banks and think tanks haveestimated that U.S. corporations actually held $1.5 trillion to$2.5 trillion in offshore funds at the time the law wasenacted.

While the pace at which companies are bringing back profits hasslowed, the figure for the fourth quarter of last year was revisedup, from $85.9 billion to $146.6 billion.

Before the new tax law, companies kept much of their overseasprofit offshore to avoid a 35 percent tax that kicked in when theybrought the money back to the U.S. The Republican tax law set aone-time 15.5 percent tax rate on cash and 8 percent on non-cash orilliquid assets, regardless of where the profits sat.

However, nearly half of the offshore profits may never come backto the United States because they are held in illiquid assets thatcan't easily be repatriated, according to a 2016paper led by Jennifer Blouin, a researcher at theUniversity of Pennsylvania. Only about 54 percent of offshoreprofits are held in cash, according to her research.

The repatriation figures were part of a quarterly report on thecurrent-account deficit, which narrowed to $130.4 billion in theJanuary to March period, from $143.9 billion. The gap is consideredthe broadest measure of international trade because it includesincome payments and government transfers.

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