2023 Looks Strong For Carnival and the Cruise Industry

Carnival Q4 results signal strong demand, booked backlog, cash levels

Carnival Cruise Lines reported fiscal Q4 results (for the quarter ended in November) on December 21. While they lost $0.85 a share or a total of $1.6 billion, on revenues of $3.8 billion, all of these metrics were better than Wall Street consensus estimates. Importantly, the company hit a record with a booked cash backlog of $5.1 billion. We look at Similarweb data on Carnival and peers through November 2022.

Key takeaways

• Aggregated web traffic to a group of eight cruise peers (Carnival, Celebrity, Norwegian, Princess, Royal Caribbean, Holland America, Viking, and Silversea), rose 9% in November over the prior month. November 2022 was up 49% over 2021, 353% over 2020, and was up 15% over November 2019.
• Carnival saw its web traffic grow 4% in November, month-over-month, and saw year-over-year gains of 36% over 2021, 320% in 2020, and 15% in 2019.
• Carnival ranks second in this peer group in web traffic, having been overtaken by Royal Caribbean. Overall web traffic signals demand remains robust heading into 2023.

The cruise industry has rebounded from the pandemic, and demand looks strong

A look at Similarweb data on web traffic shows that traffic to a peer group made up of eight leading cruise lines was up 9% in November 2022 over October, and was up 49% over 2021, 354% over 2020, and notably, was up 29% over November 2019, before the pandemic. With most cruise customers likely to visit a cruise website before booking a trip, these numbers are a good proxy for overall industry demand.

Carnival, which reported stronger-than-expected financial results on December 21, is also seeing strong web traffic growth. Traffic to carnival.com was up 4% in November on a month-over-month basis and was up 36% over 2021, 320% in 2020, and 15% in 2019. These results, combined with the company’s report of a record backlog at the end of fiscal Q4, likely mean the company is starting 2023 with a strong booked position and is likely to push through price increases in 2023.

Carnival is second in market share as reflected by web traffic, with Royal Caribbean first

Looking at the market share of the peer group we used in this report, Royal Caribbean led in November 2022, with a 27% share of the group, followed by Carnival with 23%, Norwegian with 16%, and Princess with 14%.

The Similarweb Insights & Communications team is available to pull additional or updated data on request for the news media (journalists are invited to write to press@similarweb.com). When citing our data, please reference Similarweb as the source and link back to the most relevant blog post or similarweb.com/blog/insights/.

Methodology

Disclaimer: All data, reports and other materials provided or made available by Similarweb are based on data obtained from third parties, including estimations and extrapolations based on such data. Similarweb shall not be responsible for the accuracy of the materials and shall have no liability for any decision by any third party based in whole or in part on the materials.

by Jim Corridore

Senior Analyst

Jim provides insights across multiple sectors. With 30 years on Wall Street and numerous awards for stock-picking, he is a SUNY Albany graduate.