On Thursday, Airbnb reported a loss of $1.17 billion which was over three times more than the loss incurred from the first quarter.
Even though the company’s revenue rose, the loss was incurred due to travel restrictions during the pandemic and the repayment of debts and money they had borrowed previously.
With the promise of vaccines for the coronavirus being administered, Airbnb’s revenue increased recording billions in new bookings.
In a letter to the shareholders the company stated, “we expect a travel rebound like anything.”
At the same time the home-sharing business also expressed its concerns about it being too early to predict the rate of travel recovery in the second half of the year.
While bookings in the cities, which were a main source of revenue pre-pandemic, haven’t yet recovered, the company is witnessing an increase in demand for rentals for ‘away-from-the-city’ locations in the U.S.
The loss incurred because of debt repayment and borrowed funds were recorded at $1.95 per share as compared to the estimate of $1.07 loss per share by Wall Street.
On the other hand, new bookings in the quarter have jumped to a value of $10.3 billion from the previous years’ $6.8 billion.
Airbnb shares fell 3.2% in regular and below 1% in extended trading.
The company has seen a drop of 37% in its shares since its last peak in February 11.
CEO Brian Chesky predicts an increased and ready rate of bookings post-pandemic.
He said, “There’s a lot of opportunities for us, I think, to point demand to where we have available supply, which will allow us to steadily increase occupancy.”
Airbnb
