Airbnb toasts “best quarter ever” with revenue exceeding one billion dollars
San Francisco: Airbnb has said it has had its “best quarter ever” with its revenue taken in during the past three months exceeding a billion dollars.
Airbnb said in a memo: “The third quarter of 2018 was the strongest quarter in Airbnb history, and the first quarter in which Airbnb recognized substantially more than $1 billion in revenue.”
The development came as Airbnb prepared for an initial public offering (IPO) potentially as soon as mid-2019 at a valuation estimated to be over $30 billion.
As a private company, Airbnb is not required to disclose its performance, and no detailed financial information has been shared in the memo.
However, the San Francisco-based short-term rental platform is believed to be on course to make a profit for the second consecutive year
The company said that more than 400 million guests ‘arrivals’ have been logged at Airbnb-listed properties since the service was launched a decade ago.
The number of Airbnb guests in the third quarter rose in cities such as Beijing, Mexico City, Johannesburg and Birmingham among others.
Airbnb is envisaging that nearly a million guests will book to stay in its lodgings during the Thanksgiving holiday weekend later this month.
In recent years, Airbnb has been the subject of criticism from regulators who argue the rental platform skirts taxes and hotel regulations while increasing pressure on housing by encouraging property owners to make homes available to tourists rather than local residents.
In addition, Airbnb is being sued by the main trade group for French hotels, who accuses it of unfair competition by “knowingly violating” rules imposed as part of a crackdown in one of Airbnb’s biggest and most profitable markets.
Paris has been leading the charge in France against Airbnb and similar home-sharing platforms, claiming they have driven up home prices while depriving municipalities of income tax that is not being declared.
Similar actions have also taken place in other popular tourist destinations like Amsterdam, Barcelona, Berlin, and New York.
