Tracking Stocks
On August 9, 2012 Liberty completed the approved recapitalization of its common stock through the creation of the Liberty Interactive common stock and Liberty Ventures common stock as tracking stocks. In the recapitalization, each holder of Liberty Interactive Corporation common stock remained a holder of the same amount and series of Liberty Interactive common stock and received 0.05 of a share of the corresponding series of Liberty Ventures common stock, by means of a dividend, with cash issued in lieu of fractional shares of Liberty Ventures common stock.
Tracking stock is a type of common stock that the issuing company intends to reflect or "track" the economic performance of a particular business or "group," rather than the economic performance of the company as a whole. Liberty has two tracking stocks—Liberty Interactive common stock and Liberty Ventures common stock, which are intended to track and reflect the economic performance of the Interactive Group and Ventures Group, respectively. While the Interactive Group and the Ventures Group have separate collections of businesses, assets and liabilities attributed to them, no group is a separate legal entity and therefore cannot own assets, issue securities or enter into legally binding agreements. Holders of tracking stocks have no direct claim to the group's stock or assets and are not represented by separate boards of directors. Instead, holders of tracking stock are stockholders of the parent corporation, with a single board of directors and subject to all of the risks and liabilities of the parent corporation.
The term "Ventures Group" does not represent a separate legal entity, rather it represents those businesses, assets and liabilities that have been attributed to that group. The Ventures Group is comprised primarily of our consolidated subsidiary TripAdvisor and interests in Expedia, Inc., Interval Leisure Group, Inc., Tree.com, Inc., investments in Time Warner Inc. and Time Warner Cable Inc., as well as cash in the amount of approximately $658 million (at December 31, 2013), including subsidiary cash. The Ventures Group also has attributed to it certain liabilities related to our Exchangeable Debentures and certain deferred tax liabilities. The Ventures Group is primarily focused on the maximization of the value of these investments and investing in new business opportunities.
The term "Interactive Group" does not represent a separate legal entity, rather it represents those businesses, assets and liabilities that have been attributed to that group. The Interactive Group is primarily focused on our video and E-commerce operating businesses and has attributed to it the remainder of our businesses and assets, including our operating subsidiaries QVC, Provide Commerce, Inc., Backcountry.com, Inc., Bodybuilding.com, LLC, Celebrate Interactive Holdings, LLC and CommerceHub as well as our interest in HSN, Inc. including cash of approximately $598 million (at December 31, 2013), including subsidiary cash. The Interactive Group has attributed to it liabilities that reside with QVC and the other consolidated subsidiaries, described above, as well as our outstanding senior notes and certain deferred tax liabilities.
At the time of issuance of the Liberty Ventures common stock, cash of $1,346 million was reattributed to the Ventures Group from the Interactive Group. The Interactive Group borrowed funds under QVC's credit facility just prior to the completion of the recapitalization in order for Liberty to have an appropriate amount of cash available to be attributed to each tracking stock group. The reattribution of cash between the tracking stock groups had no consolidated impact on Liberty.
See Exhibit 99.1 to this Annual Report on Form 10-K for unaudited attributed financial information for Liberty's tracking stock groups.
