Carnival Corp. Cruises to Higher Profit

Miami-based cruise company Carnival Corporation & plc has reported non-GAAP net income of USD 193 million for the second quarter of 2015, improving its quarterly earnings by more than double compared to non-GAAP net income for the second quarter of 2014 of USD 73 million.

For the second quarter of 2015, US GAAP net income, which included unrealized gains on fuel derivatives of USD 34 million and USD 7 million of restructuring expenses, was USD 222 million, compared to USD 98 million GAAP net income recorded in the second quarter of 2014.

”Our initiatives to create demand and leverage our scale benefited both cruise ticket prices and onboard revenues contributing to 5% revenue yield improvement (constant currency) this quarter,” said Carnival’s President and Chief Executive Officer Arnold Donald.

”While all of our North American brands enjoyed strong revenue yield improvement, our Carnival Cruise Line brand performed particularly well again this quarter.”

During the last thirteen weeks, fleetwide booking volumes for the next three quarters of FY2015 were running well ahead of last year at slightly lower prices due to transactional currency impacts, Carnival says. At this time, cumulative advance bookings for the next three quarters are well ahead of the prior year at slightly lower prices again due to transactional currency impacts.

The company continues to expect full year 2015 net revenue yields on a constant currency basis to be up 3 to 4 percent, which excludes translational and transactional currency impacts, compared to the prior year (up 2 to 3 percent on a constant dollar basis compared to the prior year).

Carnival now expects full year 2015 net cruise costs excluding fuel per ALBD (available lower berth day) to be up approximately 3 percent compared to the prior year on a constant dollar basis, which is slightly higher than had been anticipated in the March guidance mainly due to increased investment in advertising.

Taking the above factors into consideration, the company has increased its full year 2015 non-GAAP diluted earnings per share guidance to be in the range of USD 2.35 to USD 2.50, compared to 2014 non-GAAP diluted earnings of USD 1.93 per share.