TUI Group has maintained its full-year profit guidance despite weaker third-quarter trading, with geopolitical disruption, consumer caution, and higher costs pushing holiday bookings closer to departure dates.
The travel group reported third-quarter underlying EBIT of €235m, down from €321m a year earlier, while revenue fell 5.6% to €5.9bn at constant currency. TUI carried 9.9m customers across its businesses during the quarter, 3% fewer than a year earlier.
After nine months, underlying EBIT stood at around €123m compared with €165m in the previous year. The company said the war in Iran and the hurricane in Jamaica produced a combined €81m negative earnings effect over that period.
Chief executive Sebastian Ebel said: “2026 is no ordinary year. TUI has held its own well in a difficult global environment. Our business model is proving to be resilient. Travel remains highly relevant to people’s lives, but the timing of travel decision has shifted.”
The shift is visible in the summer booking data. Booked revenue for the Markets + Airline business remains 6% below the previous-year position, although that is one percentage point better than the update in May.
TUI said the latest four-week period produced a 7% increase in booked revenue, suggesting demand is strengthening later in the season. Short- and medium-haul destinations including Greece and Spain remain particularly popular, while demand in the eastern Mediterranean has also begun to recover.
The later booking pattern changes the economics of capacity management. Tour operators and airlines commit aircraft, hotel capacity, staffing, and other resources before they know final demand. Less forward visibility can increase the pressure on pricing and make it harder to match capacity precisely to customer behaviour.
The impact is most apparent in Markets + Airline, which moved from a €50m underlying profit in the comparable quarter to a €16m loss. TUI attributed the change to geopolitical disruption, higher fuel costs, additional industry capacity, price pressure, and cautious demand.
The Northern Region, which includes the UK, Ireland, and Nordic countries, generated underlying EBIT of €10m compared with €45m a year earlier. Central Europe moved from a €25m profit to a €10m loss, while the Western Region remained loss-making but improved.
TUI’s Holiday Experiences business provided greater stability. Hotels & Resorts, Cruises, and TUI Musement together generated €278m of underlying EBIT during the quarter, compared with €294m a year earlier.
Hotels & Resorts produced an operating result of €121m. Available bed nights increased slightly, but occupancy fell five percentage points to 77%, reflecting new-hotel ramp-up and weaker demand in the eastern Mediterranean, Mexico, and the Caribbean.
Cruises generated €133m, although two Mein Schiff vessels remained in Gulf ports from March until mid-May because of the Iran conflict. The business incurred a €20m direct effect during the quarter before operations resumed.
The contrast between TUI’s owned holiday assets and its tour-operator and airline operations illustrates the role of its integrated model. Hotels, cruises, experiences, distribution, and aviation respond differently to disruptions, allowing stronger areas to offset part of the volatility elsewhere.
The company has retained its expectation for underlying EBIT of between €1.1bn and €1.4bn for the 2026 financial year, assuming there is no significant escalation in geopolitical tensions and fuel supplies remain secure.
Its revenue forecast remains suspended. That difference indicates greater confidence in the company’s ability to manage earnings than in predicting the final level of customer sales during a period when booking timing remains unusually volatile.
Efficiency measures and the mix of owned products can support profitability, but short-notice demand still creates risks around pricing and capacity. A sustained move towards later bookings could require travel groups to operate with less advance certainty even after current geopolitical disruption eases.
TUI will provide its next trading update on 22 September, including the remainder of the summer season and the winter 2026/27 booking position. That should provide a clearer indication of whether the recent improvement represents a durable recovery in demand or a concentrated wave of late summer bookings.
You must be logged in to post a comment.