The world’s largest hotel companies expect independent hoteliers to flock to flag affiliations and their accompanying global reach during the coronavirus recovery to rebuild business. Don’t hold your breath, says an organization representing boutique hotels. The Boutique Lifestyle Leaders Association and partner organization StayBoutique launched this week the BoutiqueStrong campaign and council to provide boutique […]

Hilton's CFO Kevin Jacobs weighs in on the outlook for hotels struggling from the COVID-19 pandemic.

(Bloomberg) -- Park Hotels & Resorts Inc. has held discussions with lenders including Bank of America Corp. about a potential $500 million high-yield bond offering, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.The Tysons, Virginia-based real estate investment trust, which was spun out of Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc., has sought credit ratings ahead of what would be an inaugural junk bond, said the person, who requested anonymity because the talks are private. The company could launch a transaction as soon as this week, the person added.Spokesmen for Park Hotels and Bank of America declined to comment.Companies including cruise line operators, airlines and hotel chains have sold bonds in recent weeks to shore up liquidity as a global pandemic keeps travelers at home. Park Hotels, like many of its rivals, has seen the value of its shares plummet. Its stock has tumbled more than 65% year-to-date, giving it a market value of about $1.9 billion.In delivering first-quarter earnings earlier Monday, the company said it had suspended operations at 38 of its 60 hotels due to Covid-19, and had reduced the capacity at its remaining hotels to 15%. Its portfolio includes the Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikiki Beach Resort, the Hilton San Francisco Union Square and the New York Hilton Midtown.Park Hotels has fully drawn on its $1 billion revolving credit facility as a precautionary measure, and extended its maturity to December 2021, receiving covenant waivers from lenders in the process, it said.The company has $1.2 billion in current liquidity and a cash burn rate of $70 million per month in an extreme situation with all operations suspended. That leaves it well positioned to navigate the virus disruption, Thomas J. Baltimore Jr., the company’s chief executive officer said in a statement.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

A few companies are already giving the public a glimpse of life after stringent coronavirus restrictions wind down in earnest. 

Marriott International's (MAR) first-quarter results hurt by sharp decline in RevPAR and occupancy rates owing to the coronavirus pandemic.

HLT earnings call for the period ending March 31, 2020.

Activist investor releases 1st-quarter portfolio Continue reading...

It's good to see businesses emerge from the worst of the COVID-19

The first-quarter earnings season has revealed how quickly companies are embracing digital and automation strategies, as they shift to dealing with consumers who are complying with stay-at-home rules and other restrictions on movement during the coronavirus pandemic.

Dave Johnson, Aimbridge Hospitality CEO, joins Yahoo Finance's Alexis Christoforous and Brian Sozzi to discuss its plans to recover from the impact of COVID-19 and future outlook for the overall hotel industry.

It is going to be a while before Hilton returns to last year’s performance levels. Hilton had its strongest year on record during its centennial celebration in 2019, the company’s CEO Chris Nassetta said Tuesday during a Washington Post livestream. But the coronavirus pandemic forced the company to suspend operations at many of its hotels […]

The Internet Ecosystem Innovation Committee (IEIC), an independent committee that promotes internet diversity and resilience through the formation of new global internet nexus points, today announced that Akamai (NASDAQ: AKAM) has joined as a founding member.

Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Capital Management Ltd. has bought a $25 million stake in private equity firm Blackstone Group Inc. (BX) in the first quarter.Pershing Square said it built a position of almost 549,000 shares of Blackstone, according to a SEC filing. In addition, the billionaire’s portfolio disclosed a new position in Park Hotels & Resorts Inc. (PK), in which it bought 678,000 shares, valued at about $5.4 million, as of March 31.Shares in Blackstone this year slumped as much as 35% as of March 23. However, since then the stock has seen a nice recovery soaring 42% and trading at $51.07 as of Friday. In the first quarter of the year, Park Hotels shares have lost as much as 81%.The hedge fund manager has also taken some profits. During the first quarter, Pershing divested about 32% of the portfolio’s stake in Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG). The value of the burrito chain’s shares has more than doubled in the past two months. Furthermore, Ackman bumped up investments in current holdings, including Starbucks (SBUX), Agilent Technologies Inc. (A), Lowes Companies (LOW) and Restaurant Brands International (QSR).Despite strong stock market volatility triggered by the coronavirus pandemic, Pershing’s portfolio this year returned 16.5% on its investments as of May 12.At the beginning of the year, billionaire investor Ackman moved to protect the firm’s stock portfolio against coronavirus-related panic selling in markets by buying credit default swaps. Pershing Square yielded a stellar $2.6 billion from hedging its stock portfolio through the credit protection. Most of the return was invested in buying more shares of the fund’s portfolio companies including, Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. (HLT) and Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A).Ackman is this year also upbeat about investment into infrastructure projects helping the U.S. economy recover from the repercussions of the coronavirus outbreak. In March, Pershing invested $500 million in Howard Hughes Corp. (HHC), one of the largest real estate development companies in the US.Last week, both Brian Bedell at Deutsche Bank and Christopher Harris at Wells Fargo raised Blackstone’s price target to $47 and $63 respectively from $43 and $58 previously. Bedell has a Hold rating on the stock while Harris views it as a Buy.Overall, TipRanks data shows that Wall Street analysts are cautiously optimistic about the shares with 8 Buys and 4 Holds adding up to a Moderate Buy consensus. The $54.10 average price target implies 5.9% upside potential over the coming year. (See Blackstone stock analysis on TipRanks).Related News: Buffett’s Berkshire Shaves Off 84% Of Its Goldman Sachs Stake Carl Icahn Initiates Position in Delek US Holdings, Boosts Occidental Petroleum Is Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) Stock a Buy? This Analyst Says Yes More recent articles from Smarter Analyst: * Apple China Sales On Recovery Path In April, iPhone Sales Jump 160% - Report * Vermilion Energy CEO Steps Down With Immediate Effect * American Airlines and Others Given Go-Ahead to Reduce Route Coverage * Facebook Workplace Hits 5 Million Paid Users As Remote Work Demand Rises

Hilton CFO, Kevin Jacobs, joins Yahoo Finance's Alexis Christoforous and Brian Sozzi to discuss the current state of the company and overall industry, long-term outlook, Hilton's CleanStay program with Lysol & Mayo Clinic and more.

Bye-bye hotel buffet, said Aimbridge Hospitality CEO Dave Johnson.

(Bloomberg) -- Sheryl Sandberg’s schedule was packed as the Facebook Inc. chief operating officer arrived in Portland, Oregon, for a summer forum of state prosecutors who were meeting to talk shop and share ideas with one another.Sandberg was slated to chat with the state officials about corporate citizenship in the digital age during a private morning session that Facebook had organized at the downtown Hilton Hotel in June 2018. She had a meet-and-greet with Utah’s attorney general, Sean Reyes, who had been considered the year before for the chairmanship of the Federal Trade Commission. Later, in another Facebook-organized meeting, Sandberg and other company managers talked about digital privacy with the state legal chiefs.The meetings took place three months after reports that Facebook had allowed the harvesting of personal data of millions of users without their permission, in what became known as the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Federal and state lawmakers were escalating pressure on the company over the data breach as well as its dominance of the social-media market. The FTC and several state attorneys general had opened investigations.According to emails reviewed by Bloomberg, the sessions with Sandberg during the National Association of Attorneys General summer meeting were just one day in a multi year outreach program aimed at state prosecutors. Hundreds of emails were sent between company executives and state officials from 2017 to 2019, a sample of which were seen by Bloomberg. The emails were obtained through the Freedom of Information Act by the Tech Transparency Project, which is part of the Campaign for Accountability, a political watchdog group.The emails show how Facebook went to great lengths to develop friendly relationships with powerful state prosecutors who could use their investigative and enforcement powers in ways that could harm Facebook’s revenue growth. In the end, the company’s charm offensive met with mixed results: Most of those attorneys general are now investigating the company for possible antitrust violations.Facebook isn’t unique among large companies in establishing contact with state attorneys general, and the Campaign for Accountability doesn’t allege wrongdoing by the social-media giant.“Attorneys general have massive jurisdiction over businesses and virtually everything they do,” said James Tierney, who served as Maine’s attorney general for a decade. “Every major industry should develop an understanding of attorneys general and reach out to them.”The state-level campaign played out as the company was also expanding its Washington presence to deal with allegations beyond antitrust and privacy, including that foreign interests had exploited its platform to interfere in elections.Over the last few years, the company has broken its own federal lobbying records, reconfigured the leadership of its policy shop, and brought Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg to Washington to woo critics, including for meetings with President Donald Trump, who has accused the company of suppressing right-leaning perspectives.The Campaign for Accountability, a nonprofit that has investigated technology companies, politicians and abortion-rights opponents, among others, obtained the emails from the AGs’ offices. Its executive director, Daniel Stevens, declined to name donors to the organization other than to say that they aren’t corporations and include the New Venture Fund, a public-interest philanthropy. Stevens’s group is also part of Freedom From Facebook & Google, an anti-big-tech coalition that counts Public Citizen and the Communications Workers of America as members.Facebook said the company has longstanding relationships with state AGs to collaborate on initiatives to keep the internet safe. “The country’s attorneys general take online safety seriously and so do we,” said Will Castleberry, Facebook’s vice president of state and local public policy. “That’s why for many years we have taken every measure to help them in protecting people and being the best partners we can be.” Facebook has worked with state prosecutors to promote online safety under a program that dates back to 2013.A Facebook spokesman said it’s continuing to work with state attorneys general on responding to the spread of Covid-19 and other issues.Allison Gilmore, the chief communications officer for the AGs’ association, confirmed that Facebook held a meeting at the same Hilton Hotel in June 2018, but said it wasn’t coordinated by the association, which doesn’t accept money from corporations to host events. “It is fairly common for outside organizations to schedule their own meetings adjacent to NAAG events, since more attorneys general are likely to be in attendance and available,” Gilmore said in a statement.While state attorneys general are law enforcement officials, they are also politicians and many see the post as a stepping stone to higher office. Corporate lobbyists often donate to their campaigns and schmooze with them at legal conferences, while also pressing their case on state regulatory issues.The emails show that Facebook offered to produce, distribute and promote public service messages for the state prosecutors. It hosted high-level meetings between the AGs and company executives. It also donated to the state prosecutors’ political campaigns and at times worked through them to craft state laws that might affect the company’s practices.Attorneys general looking to promote their ideas or accomplishments couldn’t do much better than Facebook’s offer of access to its platform. It has 1.7 billion daily users and can micro-target individuals by location and demographics. An Amazon.com Inc. spokeswoman said the company often works with state AGs on consumer protection issues such as privacy and price gouging, but said she isn’t aware it offers them any advertising discounts. The spokeswoman for the AGs’ association said she isn’t aware of any event hosting or filming of public-service ads by other large tech companies.Facebook and its employees, including Sandberg, donated more than $237,315 to various attorney general campaigns between 2014 and 2020, according to FollowTheMoney.org, which tracks political contributions at the state and local level. Microsoft Corp. and its employees gave $128,192 to attorneys general, Alphabet Inc.’s Google and its employees gave $120,686 and Amazon gave $43,945 in the same period, according to the campaign finance-tracking group.Facebook has also given nearly $579,000 to the Democratic and Republican associations of attorneys general between 2014 and 2018, according to the Center for Responsive Politics’ database, which goes up to 2018. Google and Microsoft gave slightly smaller amounts in the same period.Spokespeople for Microsoft, Google and Amazon declined to comment on their donations.During the NAAG meeting in Portland, Facebook provided a top official as a speaker, according to the agenda. Erin Egan, Facebook’s chief privacy officer, joined a panel to discuss social media companies’ use of consumer data, along with former Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen and a lobbyist for a technology trade group.In the private meeting later that day, in addition to Sandberg, Egan, former general counsel Colin Stretch and Castleberry also planned to be present, according to an email from Castleberry to Reyes, the Utah attorney general. They discussed “the specifics of CA,” an apparent reference to Cambridge Analytica, the political consulting firm with ties to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign that obtained the Facebook data.‘Tremendous Corporate Partner’Alan Crooks, a political consultant for Utah’s attorney general, confirmed that Reyes met with Sandberg at the conference, but said the relationship with Facebook began years before. The social media giant had provided financial backing and expertise to a task force on internet crimes against children that the Utah attorney general and others were involved in. Facebook donated $25,000 to Reyes’s campaigns between 2014 and 2020, according to FollowTheMoney.org. In the same period, Microsoft gave Reyes $9,209, Amazon contributed $5,000 and Google $2,500.“Facebook has been a tremendous corporate partner” but it doesn’t get any special consideration in return for its help, Reyes said in a statement. “It is no secret that my office and other state AGs are currently investigating Facebook.”Reyes was potentially a well-placed ally for Facebook. In early 2017, Trump’s transition team included his name on its short list for FTC chairman, where he would have overseen both privacy and antitrust as one of Facebook’s most important regulators. The position went to Joe Simons, its current chairman.Facebook’s outreach helped it secure a key win in Vermont. In May 2019, an outside lobbyist for Facebook sent an email to Vermont Assistant Attorney General Ryan Kriger and State Representative Michael Marcotte, who were collaborating on the drafting of a new data-privacy bill. The lobbyist asked them to delay a vote on the bill so that Facebook could propose modifications. Kriger and Marcotte agreed to the delay, the emails show.Marcotte said it’s not unusual for lawmakers to delay a vote to seek input from organizations that have a stake in the outcome. “It was just to make it crystal clear what could be done and what can’t be done,” Marcotte said.During deliberations on the bill, Facebook asked to add language that ensures that companies could still use students’ information for marketing purposes as long as it wasn’t identifiable, according to Marcotte. While some lawmakers thought the added language was redundant, it eventually made it into a bill that became law in March, Marcotte said.Vermont DonationsFacebook donated a total of $8,580 to the campaigns of Vermont Attorney General Thomas Donovan between 2014 and 2020, according to FollowTheMoney.org. His office didn’t respond to requests for comment. In the same period, Google gave Donovan $4,000 and Microsoft gave $2,500.In February 2018, the emails show, Reyes and three other attorneys general encouraged their colleagues to participate in a video urging citizens to report suspected trafficking cases to the National Human Trafficking Hotline.“Our partners at Facebook are providing the production and distribution of a human trafficking awareness PSA, to be distributed via Facebook users beginning March 30,” the attorneys general wrote. The PSAs were filmed at an NAAG event and developed in conjunction with Thorn, an anti-human trafficking organization founded by actors Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore.At the time, Congress was pushing forward with a measure to narrow liability protections for websites that knowingly facilitate sex trafficking. Tech companies, including Facebook, initially opposed the legislation because it weakened the much-loved Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects internet platforms from lawsuits over content posted by third parties.The ads allowed Facebook to show it could fight sex trafficking without having to change the liability shield. But after a barrage of criticism, Facebook changed course and supported the legislation. Trump signed the bill into law in April 2018.In a January 2017 email, Castleberry thanked Idaho Attorney General Lawrence Wasden’s office for participating in a video that encouraged consumers and organizations to maintain internet privacy and safety practices as part of an industry-backed public awareness campaign. He also sent instructions on how to use a “$3,000 coupon code,” so Wasden could advertise the video to constituents on Facebook without having to pay Facebook’s normal advertising rate. A spokesman confirmed that Wasden participated in the video, but said that his office didn’t use the promotional credit.Sandberg has donated $4,700 to AG campaigns between 2014 and 2020, according to FollowTheMoney.org. That doesn’t include $5,000 to Letitia James in her successful campaign for New York attorney general in 2018. The money was later returned, and James is now leading an antitrust investigation of Facebook, joined by 46 other AGs.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

The world’s major hotel brands are upping the ante on cleaning in an effort to win customer confidence and capture whatever market share exists in the travel industry’s initial coronavirus recovery. Be it ultra luxury or roadside economy, hoteliers know they have to evolve operations to a new, socially distanced normal in light of coronavirus. […]

It's easy to match the overall market return by buying an index fund. Active investors aim to buy stocks that vastly...

Hilton (HLT) witnesses gradual increase in demand across China. Hilton has 255 hotels in operation in the Greater China region.

Hilton (NYSE: HLT) has announced the reopening of all of its hotels in the Chinese Mainland, welcoming guests once again with Hilton's signature hospitality. As part of its global recovery process, Hilton also announced recently the upcoming Hilton CleanStay initiative to ensure the safety and well-being of guests and Team Members.