Booking Holdings Aids Travelers With Cover Genius Deal

Booking Holdings Inc. BKNG is leaving no stone unturned to drive its customer momentum on the back of expanding partnerships and robust travel booking offerings.

In this regard, Booking Holdings' subsidiary, Priceline, partnered with Cover Genius to enhance travelers' flights, hotels, rental cars and package booking experiences by providing them with customer-centric travel protection.

The partnership allows travelers to easily review policy details, access support, file claims, and receive instant payments for approved claims through their XCover Account.

Booking Holdings is expected to gain solid popularity among U.S. travelers on the back of this latest partnership.

Expanding Partnerships Aid Prospects

Per a Statista report, the global travel and tourism market is expected to hit $927.3 billion in 2024 and reach $1.06 trillion by 2028, indicating a CAGR of 3.5% during the forecast period of 2024-2028.

An MMR report indicated the online travel booking market is likely to reach $1.18 trillion by 2030, witnessing a CAGR of 9.7% between 2024 and 2030.

Booking Holdings remains well-poised to capitalize on these solid growth opportunities on the back of its expanding partnerships.

Apart from the Cover Genius collaboration, Priceline formed a long-term partnership with Amadeus to enhance its air distribution and IT capabilities, allowing it to access content through the Amadeus Travel Platform.

Priceline can also access Amadeus' unique air content and a Custom Search solution, providing customers with personalized offers and driving growth in key performance areas like response time and conversion.

Booking Holdings' subsidiary, Agoda, partnered with DBS to introduce a reward points redemption system for Hong Kong customers, allowing them to redeem points for value travel deals and reduce booking costs, thereby expanding Booking Holdings' customer base in Asia.

Intensifying Competition

However, this Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) company faces stiff competition from players like TripAdvisor TRIP, Airbnb ABNB and Expedia Group EXPE, which are also making continuous efforts to capitalize on growth opportunities present in the online travel booking market.

Recently, TripAdvisor's subsidiary Viator partnered with Amazon to integrate 300,000+ tours, activities, and excursions into Amazon's Alexa Smart Properties for Hospitality offerings. This allows guests to explore local travel experiences from their hotel rooms using voice and touch interactions.

Meanwhile, Airbnb unveiled a few updates for group booking, including a new category called "Icons" hosted by celebrated personalities in music, film, TV and sports. These features will allow users to create shared wishlists, invite friends or family, add properties, leave notes or vote on bookings.

Expedia, on the other hand, partnered with Wells Fargo and Mastercard to launch two co-branded credit cards, namely One Key and One Key+. The cards are designed to offer more flexibility for U.S. travelers. It offers rewards such as OneKeyCash, which can be used across Expedia, Hotels.com, and Vrbo to book hotels, vacation rentals, car rentals, activities and flights.

Conclusion

BKNG shares have gained 11.3% in the year-to-date period, underperforming the industry's 15.2% growth. Stiff competition, coupled with the declining trend in agency bookings are hurting Booking Holdings. Also, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East region remain concerning for the company.

Despite these headwinds, BKNG's strong partner base, expanding global footprint and robust travel booking offerings bode well for its long-term growth prospects. Its solid momentum across the merchant, advertising and other businesses, growing alternative accommodation business and flight capabilities should aid business growth in the days ahead.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2024 revenues is pegged at $23.09 billion, indicating year-over-year growth of 8.05%.

The consensus mark for 2024 earnings is pegged at $178.55 per share, indicating a 17.3% rise from the year-ago figure. The figure has been revised upward by 0.01% in the past seven days.

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