Shares of Booking Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:BKNG) rallied in early trading on Wednesday, after the company reported third-quarter results on Tuesday.
Here are some key analyst takeaways:
- RBC Capital Markets analyst Brad Erickson maintained an Outperform rating, while lowering the price target from $220 to $205.
- Wedbush analyst Ygal Arounian reiterated an Outperform rating, while cutting the price target from $247 to $210.
- Rosenblatt Securities analyst Scott Devitt reaffirmed a Buy rating, while reducing the price target from $245 to $210.
- Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Deepak Mathivanan maintained a Neutral rating, while lowering the price target from $170 to $150.
- BTIG analyst Jake Fuller reiterated a Buy rating and price target of $250.
Check out other analyst stock ratings.
RBC Capital Markets: Booking Holdings reported “relatively solid” results, despite the more challenging macro environment, Erickson said in a note. While room nights grew by 7% year-on-year, the company’s fourth-quarter guidance cut did not come as a huge surprise given the macro challenges, Erickson added.
Management indicated tailwinds from agentic AI, with on-platform agents resulting in higher engagement, better conversion, and higher booking value, the analyst stated.
Although the estimates and price target have been lowered, “the company’s big picture growth, earnings and return of capital algo make the stock attractive,” Erickson further wrote.
Wedbush: Booking Holdings’ room nights of 345 million, gross bookings of $54.5 billion and adjusted revenue of $9.8 billion were higher than expectations, Arounian said. Arounian added, however, that management’s fourth-quarter guidance was “well below” consensus due to softer travel trends in Europe and the Middle East.
Core travel demand had been returning to normal before the new disruptions, the analyst noted.
While traffic driven via LLMs accelerated, this remains well under 1% of room nights, while the company builds its own agentic ecosystem, Arounian further stated.
Rosenblatt Securities: Booking Holdings’ adjusted EBITDA grew 8.9% year-on-year to $4.6 billion, Devitt said. Devitt added, however, that management guided fourth-quarter adjusted EBITDA roughly flat year-on-year and room night growth of 1%-3%, below Street expectations of around 5.9%.
The analyst noted that management attributed the disappointing guidance to:
- Tougher comps
- Continued disruption in the Middle East
- Elevated investment
“We believe the threat of AI disintermediation is overblown, and the duration of growth is longer than the market appreciates,” Devitt further wrote.
Cantor Fitzgerald: While the macro environment remained “relatively resilient” through most of the third quarter, trends weakened in late September, Mathivanan said. The softness seems to have extended into October and is largely in EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa), Mathivanan added.
“BKNG did not provide an outlook for FY27E but expressed confidence in its LT growth framework of 8-8-15% for GB-Rev-EPS,” Mathivanan further wrote.
BTIG: The upside delivered by Booking Holdings was typical and across the board, Fuller stated. The weak guidance seems to be “more about temporary factors than an impairment,” Fuller added.
“We’re actually hearing upbeat commentary around U.S. travel trends so far this earnings season from hoteliers & airlines,” the analyst further wrote.
BKNG Stock Price Activity: Booking Holdings shares are trading higher by 10.10% at $171.40 at the time of publication on Wednesday, according to Benzinga Pro data.
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