Carnival cruises to highest ever quarterly earnings
Carnival has cruised its way to its highest ever quarterly earnings and has said it is “well on track” to deliver nearly 25 per cent earnings growth this year.
Net income at the Miami-based cruise ship operator reached $1.4bn (£1bn) in the third quarter. Revenues came in at $5.1bn, $0.2bn higher than the same period of last year.
Previous concerns over the impact of the mosquito-borne Zika virus and heightened fears about terrorism in Europe driving down passenger numbers did not bear out, as sales rose across all main regions.
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"We delivered the strongest quarterly earnings in our company's history affirming our ongoing efforts to expand consumer demand in excess of measured capacity increases and leverage our industry leading scale," said president and chief executive Arnold Donald.
"Revenues during the peak summer season were bolstered by strong performances from both our North American and European brands and across all major deployments including the Caribbean, Alaska and Europe."
The company still expects full-year net revenue yields to be up approximately 3.5 per cent on last year and has increased its full-year adjusted earnings per share guidance to be between $3.33 to $3.37 per share, compared to June guidance of $3.25 to $3.35.
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On current trading, the company said in a statement yesterday: "At this time, cumulative advance bookings for the first half of the year are ahead of the prior year at considerably higher prices.
"Since June, booking volumes for the first half of next year are lower than the prior year, as there is less inventory remaining for sale, at significantly higher prices."
Shares at the London-listed holiday group closed down 1.4 per cent yesterday to 3,555p per share.