Slump of 99.5 percent: Carnival shipping company has almost no income

Most of the ships have been anchored for months. It was only a few weeks ago that the first passengers started to sail again. Accordingly, the world's largest cruise operator has ebb in the box office. Instead, he burns a high three-digit million amount every month.

The world's largest cruise company, Carnival, made practically no money in the summer. In the three months to the end of August, the company reported revenues totaling 31 million euros. The reason is the standstill of business in view of the global corona pandemic. Just a year ago, the summer revenues had totaled more than 6.5 billion euros.

The bottom line was now a loss of nearly $ 2.9 billion, or $ 3.69 per share. In the previous year, the Aida mother had earned a good $ 1.8 billion. The result corresponded to the number mentioned in September. Adjusted loss was $ 2.19 per share, pretty much in line with analysts' consensus estimate of $ 2.20. In the second quarter, the loss was even greater at $ 4 billion.

Aida wants to cast off again next week

The cruise company has announced that it intends to part with 18 less efficient ships – including more than 100 management positions. Ten ships have already been taken out of service. This corresponds to a reduction in capacity of twelve percent compared to the pre-Corona level. The shipping company Carnival Cruise Line canceled most US cruises by the end of the year, the luxury line Seabourn canceled the trips on three ships this week until May 2021. Cruise operators have already lost billions this year after the trips had to be canceled due to corona. Carnival expects to be able to resume business gradually.

The responsible US authorities recently banned cruises until the end of October. The group's own Costa Cruises from Italy resumed cruise operations on September 6th after months of interruption. Aida Cruises from Rostock wants to start again in mid-October. Previously, some start attempts had failed – due to renewed corona cases.

Currently burning $ 350 million a month

Carnival burned an average of 770 million dollars a month in cash in the past quarter, and around 530 million dollars on average in the current fourth quarter, it was now said. This means that the company remains in line with its earlier forecast, which assumed a monthly cash outflow of around $ 650 million for the second half of the year.

The pleasure of cruising has not yet suffered. The demand for trips in the second half of 2021, which have been bookable since September 20, is at the upper end of the historical ranges, it said. At the end of August, the group put the customer funds in its cash register at 2.4 billion dollars – the majority of these were credits that arose from canceled trips and were not paid out. At the end of May that number was $ 2.9 billion. Investors also believe in business. The Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund got involved in the spring. In addition, there are no liquidity shortages: at the end of August Carnival had cash on hand of 8.2 billion dollars.

Carnival continues to expect to close the fiscal year ended November 30th with a loss. After nine months, the company has earned just under 5.6 billion dollars, only around a third of the previous year's income. But the deficit already amounts to more than eight billion dollars. Last year the shipping company had an average of 92,000 employees on its ships, as well as 12,000 full-time and 2,000 part-time or seasonal workers.

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