In this photo illustration, the Airbnb logo is displayed on a computer monitor and cell phone on February 13, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.
Mario Tama | Getty Images
Airbnb reported first-quarter results on Wednesday that beat analysts’ estimates but offered weaker-than-expected guidance. Shares fell more than 6% in extended trading.
Here’s how the company did, compared with consensus expectations from LSEG:
Earnings per share: 41 cents vs. 24 cents expected
Revenue: $2.14 billion vs. $2.06 billion expected
Revenue increased 18% from $1.82 billion a year earlier. Airbnb reported a net income of $264 million, or 41 cents per share, compared to $117 million, or 18 cents per share, in the same period last year.
The company said revenue in its second quarter will come in between $2.68 billion and $2.74 billion. Analysts were expecting $2.74 billion for the period, according to LSEG.
In its letter to shareholders, Airbnb said it is already experiencing “robust demand for travel” ahead of the peak summer season, particularly around upcoming events like the Olympics in Paris. The company also said it expects that year-over-year revenue growth for its third quarter will accelerate compared to the second quarter, in part because of its summer travel backlog.
Other special events like the solar eclipse in North America helped drive engagement with Airbnb’s platform during the first quarter. The company said it had 500,000 guests stay on Airbnb during the eclipse, according to its investor letter.
Airbnb said adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter was $424 million, up 62% year over year. Analysts polled by StreetAccount were expecting $326 million.
Gross booking value, which Airbnb uses to track host earnings, service fees, cleaning fees and taxes, was $22.9 billion in the first quarter. The company reported 132.6 million nights and experiences booked, up 9.5% from a year ago, and higher than the 132.1 million expected by analysts, according to StreetAccount.
Growth in Airbnb’s nights and experiences booked was led by the Asia Pacific and Latin America regions, Airbnb said. The company is “particularly encouraged” by growth of its app downloads and usage, according to its shareholder letter. Airbnb app downloads in the U.S. increased 60% year over year.
Average daily rates increased 3% from a year ago to $173 in the first quarter, the company said. It ended the quarter with its “highest number of active listings yet,” according to the letter, which jumped 15% from a year earlier.
Correction: Airbnb’s quarterly net income was $264 million. An earlier version misstated the figure.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said he wants to integrate ChatGPT artificial intelligence capabilities into the travel platform but the software isn’t ready.
“The [software development kit] wasn’t quite robust enough for the things we want to do,” he told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Wednesday.
Chesky said the company would “probably” want to integrate ChatGPT eventually.
Airbnb on Tuesday launched a series of new social features, such as direct messaging, to its platform. The update also included a personalized version of the company’s chatbot launched earlier this year that can cancel and change reservations for users in North America.
In an interview with Bloomberg this week, Chesky said that the OpenAI chatbot isn’t “quite ready” for integration with Airbnb. He said the model was made using 13 different chatbots and that Airbnb is depending heavily on Alibaba’s Qwen model.
Chesky, who is a close friend of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, said it’s only the beginning of the AI revolution and he expects the technology to fuel a consumer app craze over the next few years.
“We’re all going to have to work together,” he said. “AI is going to lift up a lot of companies. If they want to vertically integrate every single thing, that’s going to be very, very difficult.”
OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Meta will lay off roughly 600 employees within its artificial intelligence unit as the company looks to reduce layers and operate more nimbly, a spokesperson confirmed to CNBC on Wednesday.
The company announced the cuts in a memo from its Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang, who was hired in June as part of Meta’s $14.3 billion investment in Scale AI. Workers across Meta’s AI infrastructure units, Fundamental Artificial Intelligence Research unit and other product-related positions will be impacted.
Meta has been aggressively investing in AI as it works to keep pace with rivals like OpenAI and Google, pouring billions of dollars into infrastructure projects and recruitment.
On Tuesday, the company announced a $27 billion deal with Blue Owl Capital to fund and develop its massive Hyperion data center in rural Louisiana. The data center is expected to be large enough to cover a “significant part of the footprint of Manhattan,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a post in July.
A new Volkswagen ID.3 electric car prepares to pass final inspection at the Volkswagen plant on May 14, 2025 in Dresden, Germany.
Sean Gallup | Getty Images News | Getty Images
German auto giant Volkswagen on Wednesday warned of temporary production outages citing China’s export restrictions on semiconductors made by Nexperia.
The update comes shortly after the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA), the country’s main car industry lobby, said the China-Netherlands dispute over Nexperia could lead to “significant production restrictions in the near future” if the supply interruption of chips cannot be swiftly resolved.
A spokesperson for Volkswagen told CNBC by email that while Nexperia is not a direct supplier of the company, some Nexperia parts are used in its vehicle components, which are supplied by Volkswagen’s direct suppliers.
“We are in close contact with all relevant stakeholders in light of the current situation to identify potential risks at an early stage and to be able to make decisions regarding any necessary measures,” a Volkswagen spokesperson said, noting that the firm’s production is currently unaffected.
“However, given the evolving circumstances, short-term effects on production cannot be ruled out,” they added.
Shares of Volkswagen traded 2.2% lower at 2 p.m. London time (9 a.m. ET).
Last month, the Dutch government took control of Nexperia, a Chinese-owned semiconductor maker based in the Netherlands, in what was seen as a highly unusual move.
The Dutch government seized control of the company, which specializes in the high-volume production of chips used in automotive, consumer electronics and other industries, citing fears the firm’s tech “would become unavailable in an emergency.”
China responded by blocking exports of the firm’s finished products, sparking alarm among Europe’s auto industry.
A spokesperson for Germany’s Economy Ministry said the government is concerned about chip supply chain difficulties, according to Reuters.