Skift Take
Could investors be whispering in Glenn Fogel's ears that what's good for Barry Diller's Expedia Group might be beneficial for Booking Holdings as well? Booking Holdings is usually a first mover in such online travel initiatives, but in this case, when it comes to cost cutting, it appears as though Booking Holdings heard the rumblings emanating from Expedia Group's Seattle headquarters.
Like other travel companies, Booking Holdings officials are grappling with the fluid nature of the coronavirus and the negative impact on its business.
And, like one other company, Expedia Group, that's been making headlines about attacking internal bloat, Booking Holdings intends to get costs in line, although the extent of any budget trims wasn't specified.
Booking Holdings CEO Glenn Fogel said during the company's fourth quarter and full-year 2019 earnings call Wednesday it's "very natural, as companies grow very rapidly and achieve great success on the bottom line, sometimes discipline lightened up a little bit. So certainly, before the coronavirus, I was already thinking that we need to make sure that we're doing everything we can to spend money correctly."
Booking Holdings forecast a 5 to 10 percent decline in room nights booked in the first quarter, a 10 to 15 percent decline in gross travel bookings, and a 3 to 7 percent falloff in revenue. As expected, the company said the most significant adverse impact has been in greater China, followed by Asia-Pacific excluding China, and there has been softness in European bookings, as well, in the past few days following the virus' entry into Italy.
Asked to compare the coronavirus with past travel disruptions, Fogel, who's been with the
