Booking Holdings posts upbeat quarterly results helped by international travel

Audio By Carbonatix

Enlarge

(Reuters) -Online travel agency Booking Holdings beat analysts’ expectations for first-quarter profit and revenue on Tuesday, as sustained demand for international travel helped the company offset weakness in the U.S. amid fears of a recession. 

The company has been benefiting from a sustained rise in tourism to Southeast Asian destinations from high-income Chinese tourists. This has also helped drive up the price of lodgings and travel services in the region.

However, U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs on imports have caused widespread worries of a recession, resulting in a pullback in consumer sentiment as well as in discretionary spending.

Earlier today, hotel operator Hilton Worldwide cut its forecast for 2025 room revenue growth, becoming the first U.S.-based hotel operator to temper its outlook as consumer spending on travel takes a hit from a global trade war.

Booking posted an adjusted profit of $24.81 per share for the quarter ended March 31, compared with analysts’ average estimate of $17.33 per share, according to data compiled by LSEG.

“There is uncertainty in the market around the near-term geopolitical and macroeconomic environment,” said CEO Glenn Fogel.

Total room nights for Booking came in at 319 million nights during the quarter, an increase of 7% from last year. It posted first-quarter gross bookings of $46.7 billion, a year-over-year increase of 7%.

Total quarterly revenue was $4.76 billion, up from $4.41 billion a year earlier. Analysts, on average, estimated revenue at $4.59 billion.

(Reporting by Aishwarya Jain and Abhinav Parmar in Bengaluru; Editing by Alan Barona)