Booking Holdings Inks €1.63B Deal to Buy Etraveli Group

Booking Holdings Inc. (BKNG), an American travel technology company, has inked a deal with funds managed by CVC Capital Partners (CVC) to snap up Etraveli Group for €1.63 billion.

Don't Miss Our Christmas Offers:

Discover the latest stocks recommended by top Wall Street analysts, all in one place with Analyst Top Stocks
Make smarter investments with weekly expert stock picks from the Smart Investor Newsletter

Founded in 2000, Etraveli Group is a global technology provider for flights. Through its consumer brands like Gotogate, Mytrip, Flightnetwork and global partnerships, the company provide search, book and fulfilment services of flights and related products.

The completion of the deal awaits certain regulatory approvals. Notably, Etraveli Group will remain headquartered in Sweden and operate as an independent business under Booking Holdings, led by their current management team, the company said in a release. See Top Smart Score Stocks on TipRanks >>

The acquisition is expected to complement Booking Holdings’ ongoing online travel and related services. (See Booking Holdings stock charts on TipRanks)

CEO Comments

The CEO of Booking Holdings, Glenn Fogel, said, “As international air travel rebounds from the impact of the pandemic, we look forward to building upon our existing relationship with Etraveli Group to make the travel booking experience easier and more seamless to support our partners and customers.”

Analyst’s Recommendation

On November 23, Tigress Financial analyst Ivan Feinseth maintained a Buy rating on the stock and assigned a price target of $3,150 (34.55% upside potential).

Feinseth said, “BKNG remains well-positioned to benefit from the recovery in travel and remains one of the best ways to play the global travel recovery, the reaccelerating global travel demand growth, and the ongoing growth of online and mobile travel bookings.”

The rest of the Street is cautiously optimistic about the stock and has a Moderate Buy consensus rating based on 11 Buys and 9 Holds. The average Booking Holdings price target of $2,854.21 implies 21.92% upside potential. Shares have gained 11.3% over the past year.

Website Traffic

TipRanks’ Website Traffic Tool, which uses data from SEMrush Holdings (SEMR), the world’s biggest website usage monitoring service, offers insight into Booking Holdings’ performance.

According to the tool, the website of Booking Holdings recorded a 19.04% monthly growth, year-over-year, in global visits in October. Also, year-to-date website growth, compared to year-to-date website growth in the previous year, has climbed 13.62%.