Rounding
In addition, if the rounded result would underflow, i.e. if the exponent would exceed the lowest representable integer value, the effective result may be either zero (possibly signed if the representation can maintain a distinction of signs for zeroes), or the smallest representable positive finite number (or the highest representable negative finite number if x is negative), possibly a denormal positive or negative number (if the mantissa is storing all its significant digits, in which case the most significant digit may still be stored in a lower position by setting the highest stored digits to zero, and this stored mantissa does not drop the most significant digit, something that is possible when base b=2 because the most significant digit is always 1 in that base), depending on the direction of rounding. The result of an underflow for the usual case of round to even is always the appropriate zero.