Booking Holdings today reported its 4th quarter and full-year 2020 financial results. Fourth quarter gross travel bookings were USD 7.3 billion, a 65% decrease from the prior year. Room nights booked in the 4th quarter decreased 60% from the prior year. The Company's results for the three and twelve months ended December 31, 2020 have been significantly and negatively impacted due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting economic conditions and government orders.
Booking Holdings' total revenues for the 4th quarter of 2020 were USD 1.2 billion, a 63% decrease from the prior year. The Company reported a net loss in the 4th quarter of 2020 of USD 165 million, compared with net income of USD 1.2 billion in the 4th quarter of 2019.
For the full-year 2020, Booking Holdings had gross travel bookings of USD 35.4 billion, a 63% decrease compared to 2019. Booking Holdings' total revenues in 2020 were USD 6.8 billion, a 55% decrease from the prior year. Net income for the full-year 2020 was USD 59 million, a 99% decrease versus the prior year.
"The travel environment continued to be challenging through the fourth quarter of 2020 and into January 2021 as COVID-19 case counts remained very high and travel restrictions were reimposed in many parts of the world. However, in recent weeks, we have started to see some improvements in booking trends that we will continue to monitor," said Glenn Fogel, Chief Executive Officer of Booking Holdings. "Looking ahead, I am more confident than ever in our long-term future and in the eventual strong recovery of travel demand. We will continue to focus on what we can control, namely investing in our business and executing against our strategic priorities to ensure we exit this crisis on a strong footing."
In its SEC filing, Booking mentioned that its growth has primarily been generated by the worldwide accommodation reservation business of Booking.com, which is its most significant brand, and has been due, in part, to the availability of a large number of properties through Booking.com. Booking.com included approximately 2,373,000 properties on its website at December 31, 2020, consisting of approximately 434,000 hotels, motels and resorts and approximately 1,939,000 homes, apartments and other unique places to stay, compared to approximately 2,580,000 properties (including approximately 460,000 hotels, motels and resorts and approximately 2,120,000 homes, apartments, and other unique places to stay) at December 31, 2019.
Booking predicted that Apple may enter the online travel reservations marketplace. “Apple also has more experience producing and developing mobile apps and has access to greater resources than we have. Apple may use or expand iTravel, Wallet, Siri (Apple's voice recognition "concierge" service), Apple Pay (Apple's mobile payment system) or another mobile app or functionality as a means of entering the online travel reservations marketplace.”
Read original article
