Marriott International Reports 3rd Qtr Earnings that Beat Estimates

Marriott International Inc reported earnings that beat estimates after demand for high-end brands increased and costs from a spun-off timeshare business went unrepeated. 

Net income totaled $143 million, or 44 cents a share, compared with a loss of $179 million, or 52 cents, a year earlier, the Bethesda, Maryland-based company said today in a statement. The year-earlier results included $324 million of pretax impairment costs at Marriott’s timeshare business, which was spun off in November 2011. Earnings were higher than the 40- cent average estimate of 13 analysts in a Bloomberg survey.

The results were buoyed by demand for Marriott’s high-end hotels in the U.S., including its luxury Ritz-Carlton brand, Patrick Scholes, a hospitality-industry analyst at research firm Suntrust Robinson Humphrey Inc. in New York, said before results were announced. Revenue per available room at Marriott’s full- service and luxury hotels climbed 6.8 percent in North America, more than the 6.3 percent revpar increase for all hotels in the region.

“Pricing power continued to improve in the quarter as hotel occupancy levels approached prior peaks,” Arne Sorenson, Marriott’s president and chief executive officer, said in the statement.
Comparable revpar rose 5 percent outside North America. The hotelier in July cut its growth forecast for international revpar to 5 percent to 7 percent for this year, down from an April forecast of 6 percent to 8 percent. Worldwide, revpar grew 6 percent in the third quarter.