Yatra Online reports a nuanced start to the new fiscal year, with a 17% rise in gross bookings amid declining revenues, as the company prioritises high-margin segments and expands its corporate client base amidst geopolitical challenges.
Yatra Online reported a mixed start to the new financial year, with gross bookings rising 17% year on year to INR21,007 million even as revenue from operations fell 10.4% to INR1,879 million, according to GuruFocus’s summary of the company’s earnings call. The travel platform said air passenger volumes grew 5% and hotel and package demand strengthened, while geopolitical disruption and weaker MICE, or meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions, business weighed on the top line. Adjusted EBITDA fell 39.4% to INR151 million.
The company’s corporate travel push remained a bright spot. Yatra added 54 new corporate customers with expected annual billable potential of INR2,273 million, and more than 30 of those wins came through Travel Pro, its offering for smaller and mid-sized firms. GuruFocus also said room nights in hotels and packages rose 30% and that gross margins in that business expanded to 9.9%, underscoring how Yatra is leaning into higher-margin categories as it expands.
Management, however, acknowledged that the quarter was still being shaped by disruption in West Asia. The company said international travel fell to below 30% of the mix from the late 30s previously, while air margins slipped from 4.6% to 4.2% because of higher fares and delays in airline incentive programmes. MICE gross margins were also hit by about INR60 million, although Siddhartha Gupta said on the call that Q2 MICE bookings were trending about 50% above Q1 and that the business had moved past the restructuring phase that shifted it towards more domestic group travel.
In its own results release for the three months and year ended March 31, 2026, Yatra said the broader corporate travel segment remained a key growth pillar and that it had added 55 new corporate clients in the prior quarter, lifting annual billing potential by INR2,709 million. The company said it remained focused on scaling high-margin businesses and deepening technology capabilities, while executive chairman Dhruv Shringi told the call that margin pressure should ease as travel normalises and deferred airline productivity-linked bonuses are recognised. Yatra did not issue formal guidance, saying the outlook is still too uncertain.
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