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Section 1 - Significant events
Financial Report
| Statutory Auditors’ Report on the Consolidated Financial Statements | Consolidated
Financial Statements | Statutory Auditors’ Report on the Financial Statements | Statutory Financial Statements
1.1.7.
Vivendi Village
Vivendi Village consists of the following companies as of December 31,
2014: Vivendi Ticketing (with See Tickets and Digitick), Watchever and
Wengo.
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Watchever
In Germany, since the start of the second half of 2014, Vivendi is carrying
out a transformation plan at Watchever to reduce costs while at the
same time exploring new content and platform monetization models. An
exceptional provision of €44 million was recorded as of June 30, 2014,
reduced by €18 million.
1.1.8.
Sale of Activision Blizzard shares
In accordance with the agreements entered into on October 11, 2013, the
83 million Activision Blizzard shares retained by Vivendi were subject to
a two-tiered lock-up provision:
p
p
from October 11, 2013 until April 9, 2014, Vivendi cannot sell,
transfer, hedge or otherwise dispose of any Activision Blizzard shares
directly or indirectly; from April 10, until July 9, 2014, Vivendi can sell
Activision Blizzard shares provided they constitute no more than the
lesser of (i) 50% of Vivendi’s 83 million remaining shares and (ii) 9%
of the outstanding shares of Activision Blizzard; and
p
p
from July 10, 2014 until January 7, 2015, Vivendi was subject to
another lock-up provision; as from January 7, 2015, Vivendi may sell
its remaining Activision Blizzard shares without restriction.
Considering the initial intention of Vivendi Management to sell these
shares at the end of the lock-up periods if market conditions were
favorable, the 83 million Activision Blizzard shares were classified as
“Assets held for sale”.
On May 22, 2014, Vivendi sold a first tranche of 41.5 million Activision
Blizzard shares for $852 million (€623 million). The €84 million capital
gain is presented in “Earnings from discontinued operations”. Taking into
account the capital gain of €123 million recorded in 2013, the capital gain
realized by Vivendi with respect to this first tranche of Activision Blizzard
shares amounted to €207 million.
As of December 31, 2014, the remaining interest of 41.5 million Activision
Blizzard shares, valued at $836 million (€689 million) was reclassified in
“available-for-sale securities” as Vivendi Management has decided not
to sell this interest in the immediate future. As of December 31, 2014,
the unrealized capital gain with respect to this interest amounted to
€273 million (before taxes), directly recognized in equity.
1.1.9.
Other
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Early redemption of bonds
Following receipt of the cash proceeds from the sale of SFR on
November 27, 2014, in order to enhance the structure of its financial
position statement, Vivendi allocated a portion of the sale proceeds
to the early redemption of all eight tranches of its euro and US dollar
denominated bonds that contained a make-whole option, representing an
aggregate principal amount of €4.25 billion and $0.6 billion. In addition,
Vivendi cancelled all of its existing bank credit facilities for €7.1 billion
and set up a new €2 billion bank credit facility, maturing in five years
(2019), with two one-year renewal options. Please refer to Section 5.
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Distribution to shareholders
On June 30, 2014, Vivendi SA paid an ordinary €1 per share to its
shareholders, from additional paid-in capital for an aggregate amount
of €1,348 million, considered as a return of capital distribution to
shareholders.
1.2. Subsequent events
The significant events that occurred between December 31, 2014 and
February 11, 2015 (the date of the Management Board Meeting that
approved Vivendi’s Financial Statements for the year ended December 31,
2014) were as follows:
p
p
on January 19, 2015, following a call for tenders carried out by
the National Rugby League, Canal+ Group secured exclusive rights
related to all of the National French Rugby Championship’s “TOP 14”
matches. These rights, which include all seven games on each match
day, play-off games, as well as the
Jour de Rugby
show, cover the
seasons 2015-2016 to 2018-2019: please refer to Section 1.1.5; and
p
p
in February 2015, Vivendi announced the creation of Vivendi Contents,
managed by Mr. Rodolphe Belmer, Chief Executive Officer of Canal+
Group. Vivendi Contents will be in charge of the design, leadership
and development of new content support for music and visual image,
and will manage related investments.
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