TCOM - Trip.com stock rises on earnings topper upbeat outlook

2023-03-07 07:11:51 ET

Trip.com ( NASDAQ: TCOM ) stock gained sharply in Tuesday’s premarket trading after posting positive earnings and offering an optimistic guide for 2023.

For the fourth quarter, the Chinese travel service provider posted adjusted EPADS of $0.11, surprising analyst that had expected a $0.02 loss. Meanwhile, $730M in revenue for the COVID-impacted quarter came in $32M stronger than the Street consensus.

“On a constant currency basis, overall air ticketing revenue for our global platforms in Q4 has also fully recovered to the pre-pandemic level. Demand for China’s outbound travel surged in Q4,” Executive Chairman James Liang told analysts on Monday. “Searches for outbound flights departing from Mainland China hit a 3-year peak following the downgrade of COVID-19 to a Class B infectious disease and China’s reopening in December. Such encouraging data reveals increasing consumer confidence in the travel industry globally. Again, since the announcement of China’s reopening, we have seen strong travel demands across our various business lines.”

He said that domestic hotel and bookings thus far in 2023 have already outpaced levels marked in Q1 2019. Outbound travel bookings meanwhile have recovered to above 40% of pre-pandemic levels.

“Our outbound travel bookings have grown by more than 300% compared to the same period last year and our hotel and air ticketing bookings on our global platforms continue to grow by triple-digits year-over-year,” CFO Cindy Wang said. “ We acknowledge the uncertainty regarding the potential looming new wave of COVID that may disrupt the recovery trends. However, we are confident in travelers’ strong desire for travel and ability to handle challenges.”

Shares of the Shanghai-based travel company rose 2.7% in premarket trading on Tuesday.

Read the earnings call transcript .

For further details see: