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Organization and Basis of Presentation
12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2022
Accounting Policies [Abstract]  
Organization and Basis of Presentation Organization and Basis of Presentation
Description of Business
Expedia Group, Inc. and its subsidiaries provide travel products and services to leisure and corporate travelers in the United States and abroad as well as various media and advertising offerings to travel and non-travel advertisers. These travel products and services are offered through a diversified portfolio of brands including: Brand Expedia®, Hotels.com®, Expedia® Partner Solutions, Vrbo®, trivago®, Orbitz®, Travelocity®, Hotwire®, Wotif®, ebookers®, CheapTickets®, Expedia Group™ Media Solutions, CarRentals.com™ and Expedia Cruises™. In addition, many of these brands have related international points of sale. We refer to Expedia Group, Inc. and its subsidiaries collectively as “Expedia Group,” the “Company,” “us,” “we” and “our” in these consolidated financial statements.
COVID-19
The COVID-19 pandemic, and measures to contain the virus, had an unprecedented impact on the global travel industry and materially and negatively impacted our business, financial results and financial condition. With the evolution of milder COVID-19 variants, availability of multiple vaccine booster doses and increasing familiarity with the virus, many COVID-19 related travel restrictions have been lifted, and countries around the world reopened their borders for foreign travel. Overall, the full duration and total impact of COVID-19 remains uncertain and it is difficult to predict how the recovery will unfold for the travel industry and, in particular, our business, going forward.
Basis of Presentation
The accompanying consolidated financial statements include Expedia Group, Inc., our wholly-owned subsidiaries, and entities we control, or in which we have a variable interest and are the primary beneficiary of expected cash profits or losses. We record our investments in entities that we do not control, but over which we have the ability to exercise significant influence, using the equity method or at fair value. We have eliminated significant intercompany transactions and accounts.
We believe that the assumptions underlying our consolidated financial statements are reasonable. However, these consolidated financial statements do not present our future financial position, the results of our future operations and cash flows.
Seasonality
We generally experience seasonal fluctuations in the demand for our travel services. For example, traditional leisure travel bookings are generally the highest in the first three quarters as travelers plan and book their spring, summer and winter holiday travel. The number of bookings typically decreases in the fourth quarter. Since revenue for most of our travel services, including merchant and agency hotel, is recognized as the travel takes place rather than when it is booked, revenue typically lags bookings by several weeks for our hotel business and can be several months or more for our alternative accommodations business. Historically, Vrbo has seen seasonally stronger bookings in the first quarter of the year, with the relevant stays occurring during the peak summer travel months. The seasonal revenue impact is exacerbated with respect to income by the nature of our variable cost of revenue and direct sales and marketing costs, which we typically realize in closer alignment to booking volumes, and the more stable nature of our fixed costs. As a result on a consolidated basis, revenue and income are typically the lowest in the first quarter and highest in the third quarter.
Significantly higher cancellations and reduced booking volumes from COVID-19 disrupted our typical seasonal pattern for bookings, revenue, profit and cash flows from 2020 through early 2022, but have generally returned to historic seasonality.