Tracking stock

Tracking stock or targeted stock are specialized equity offerings issued by a company that is based on the operations of a wholly owned subsidiary of a diversified firm. Therefore, the tracking stock will be traded at a price related to the operations of the specific division of the company being "tracked". Tracking stock typically has limited or no voting rights. Often, the reason for doing so is to separate a high-growth division from a larger parent company. The parent company and its shareholders remain in control of the subsidiary's or unit's operations.

Examples

During the dot-com bubble, some companies that predated the bubble identified their Internet operations as high-growth divisions that would benefit from a tracking stock. The best-known example is The Walt Disney Company, which issued a tracking stock for go.com. At around the same time the bubble ended, Disney retired the tracking stock. AT&T (AWE) and Sprint Corporation (PCS) also established tracking stocks for their cellular telephone operations, but neither of these tracking stocks is still outstanding.