Not being much of financial expert, it’s uncommon for me to post major news about financial results of companies active in online travel and hospitality. This time however, we stumbled upon a review and summary of recent financial figures during the 2nd quarter of 2008, released by the thee key online travel companies Expedia, Priceline and Orbitz. For the full article head over to seekingalpha.com, or continue reading for short highlights of the article. Expedia
The world’s largest online travel agent Expedia announced its second quarter earnings at the end of July. Revenues of $795 million beat the market’s expectations of $791 million. For the quarter, revenues grew 15 percent over the year and 16 percent over the quarter. Earnings per share grew a substantial 67 percent and 14 percent over the year. Bookings increased 10 percent in North America and 30 percent in Europe. Overall, bookings rose 16 percent to $5.93 billion. Currently Expedia is trading at $18.61, recovering quite good from the low price of $16.85 earlier last month.

Challenges for the company are no longer limited to the United States as Expedia is now experiencing hard times even in European markets. One of the main threats for companies as Expedia will be the capacity reduction of carriers to improve yield and to compensate for high fuel costs.

Despite lower economic growth Expedia has recently acquired Venere, an Italian online travel agency. This acquisition will add another 10,000 hotels in Europe, the Middle East and Africa to Expedia’s portfolio.

Priceline
Priceline.com continues to display a healthy growth. With revenues of $514 million this second quarter the company gained a growth of 28 percent, making up for an annual growth of 44 percent. Priceline’s international business displays a 80 percent growth in gross bookings due to the addition of markets through Agoda and a favorable exchange rate. United States’ market grew 59 percent annually, compared to 51 percent during the first quarter. Earnings per share of $1.55 were also higher as expected.

Priceline is also investing in new distribution channels and expanding the reach of their most important booking website Booking.com. The site already has a solid userbase in Europe and Italy, a region Expedia is targeting with the acquisition of Venere.

Orbitz
Orbitz announced its second quarter results on Wednesday. With revenues of $231 million, it recorded a 5 percent increase in revenues. However, revenues were lower then expected and with a reported a loss of $0.06 per share the loss was also higher then expected. The total amount of bookings grew 4% to $3 billion. International operations grew 41 percent and domestic bookings were down 1 percent to $2.6 billion.

Orbitz is also looking for means to deal with the current economic situation and is planning to expand into Russia through the HotelClub website. Also, Orbitz is currently in the process of migrating to a new global platform and further developing their pricing techniques.

Source for this financial update for the three major online travel companies is seekingalpha, so all credits goes to them. Head over to seekingalpha to read the full story.

related items

• Tripadvisor displaying rapid growth over 2008
• Ryanair terminates Expedia exclusive agreement
• Expedia and Marriott renew their partnership
• Expedia trialling sponsored links, advertisement opportunities for online travel agents?
• Ryanair signs partnership with priceline’s booking.com

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