Online travel company Lastminute.com said today it was confident of another year of improvement after making "significant progress" in the second quarter.
The group revealed that sales of holidays and events increased 93.9 per cent to $178.8 million in the three months to March 31st. It also said a growing trend to later bookings would help boost its traditionally strong fourth quarter.
Lastminute said earnings losses before interest, tax, depreciation and goodwill narrowed to $1.5 million in the first quarter, from losses of $3.1 million previously.
Chairman Mr Allan Leighton said there were indications that demand for late travel would remain strong in the key summer period.
Trading had been generally weak across the majority of the travel industry during April as customers continued the trend towards later booking. Mr Leighton said these changes gave lastminute confidence that the final quarter of the year would show "material improvement" over the equivalent period last year.
Lastminute has been on the expansion trail in recent months, most recently acquiring Online Travel for $54.9 million in its biggest-ever deal.
The tie-up boosted lastminute's product range and offers a potential customer base of 15 million as Online has 20 sites of its own and runs 60 more for travel and consumer companies, including Thomas Cook, Lunn Poly and Freeserve.
Earnings losses before interest, tax, depreciation and goodwill for the six months to March 31st narrowed to $2.6 million from losses of $4.7 million in the same period last year.