CEO Bayley says they will make China work.
During a 4th quarter earnings call, Michael Bayley told Wall Street that he believes that the Chinese market will begin to reopen after the Olympics are completed. He said, "There's a belief that after the Olympics are behind us, that there will be more positive news coming out of China. One of the positive things that has happened is, obviously, we redeployed our capacity out of the China market some time ago. And of course, one of the ships that we redeployed was Wonder of the Seas, which is our latest newest Oasis-class ship."
He added that the collapse of Genting Hong Kong could be an opportunity for the line. "I think Genting exiting the stage is, again, an opportunity for us. And our teams in Asia are already planning and leveraging what we think could be those opportunities. But our appetite for the opportunity has not shifted. We think China is always going to be a very important part of our strategic portfolio, and we are going to continue our journey as soon as the news starts to become more positive, which at some point, it does have to become more positive".
None of the financial analysts asked if there was any hesitation by the company to return to the country that launched a virus that nearly brought an end to the cruise industry.
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