Expedia plunge on weak air bookings and the resignation of the CEO
Expedia shares sank 19% on Friday after the company saw softness in air travel bookings and its CEO resigned. CNBC’s Jim Cramer said the magnitude of the stock decline may be an overreaction. While delivering an earnings-per-share beat and in-line revenue in the fourth quarter, bookings fell short, “largely driven by a reduction in average ticket prices” for air travel, management said during its post-earnings conference call. Hotel and vacation bookings, however, fared better. Investors also received the unexpected news that Expedia CEO Peter Kern will be stepping down after four years at the helm. Kern will be succeeded by Ariane Gorin, who has been with the company for more than 10 years. She was previously an executive at Microsoft between 2003 and 2013. (Microsoft is a holding in Jim’s Charitable Trus t, the portfolio used by the CNBC Investing Club .) While Expedia stock didn’t look good, Cramer acknowledged that management led by Kern “has done a great job” in bringing the company out of Covid when nobody was traveling. EXPE 5Y mountain Expedia 5 years Expedia said it sees “some softness in prices across categories” in 2024, and it expects “growth rates across the world to decelerate.”
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