How do they make money?

Booking Holdings Inc. is the holding company for Booking.com, Priceline, Kayak, and other major online travel sites.

I recently read Howard Marks' memo about the Dot Com Bubble. Written in 2000, the memo highlights some of the reasons the market was in a bubble (it was).

Howard mentions Priceline.com as one example we could be in a bubble created by companies simply adding "dot com" to their names:

"Priceline.com, which auctions off discount air tickets, (September quarter sales of $152 million, net loss of $102 million) has a market capitalization of $7.5 billion, while United and Continental Airlines ($7.1 billion sales, $469 million earnings) are worth a combined $7.3 billion."

I wanted to see where Priceline.com was today. Evidently, the company is now organized under Booking Holdings, Inc. and is still going strong.

You can clearly see the Dot Com Bubble:

Per the 2024 Annual Report, Booking Holdings, Inc. operates five major travel and booking brands, including:

The company earns 100% of its revenue through online bookings:

"Substantially all of our revenues are generated by providing online travel reservation services, which facilitate online travel purchases by travelers from travel service providers."

Those online bookings include "accommodation, rental car, airline reservations, and other travel related services."

Most of the company's revenue comes from a single website: Booking.com

Anyway, it's interesting to see a company survive the bursting of the Dot Com Bubble and a crazy valuation - only to continue to succeed today as a Fortune 500 company.