Stunted business travel hits hospitality industry hard - report
Marko Geber/DigitalVision via Getty Images

A new report released jointly by the American Hotel & Lodging Association and Kalibri Labs indicates persistently paltry business travel in the U.S. will keep the hotel industry stuck below pre-pandemic levels in 2022.
The report projects the industry to end the year down $20 billion in business travel revenue offsetting a recovery in leisure hotel spending. For major markets like San Francisco, New York, and Washington the impact is even more pointed, with business travel demand at less than half the levels observed in 2019. According to the report, demand levels are not expected to fully recover until 2024.
âWhile dwindling COVID-19 case counts and relaxed CDC guidelines are providing a sense of optimism for reigniting travel, this report underscores how tough it will be for many hotels and hotel employees to recover from years of lost revenue,â Chip Rogers, CEO of the American Hotel & Lodging Association commented. 
The stark impacts of the pandemic on the industry add to similarly emphatic reports from contemporary trade groups like the Global Business Travel Association, which declared â2020 business travel spending losses are expected to be 10 times larger than the impact of either 9/11 or the Great Recession of 2008.â
The bearish sentiment on business travel and the long road to recovery throws a modicum of cold water on recently optimistic outlook offered by airline carriers Delta Air Lines (DAL) on summer travel.
Stocks most tied to business travel trends in hospitality include Hilton Worldwide (NYSE:HLT), InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), Marriott International (NASDAQ:MAR), Choice Hotels International (CHH), Hyatt Hotels (NYSE:H), Tripadvisor (TRIP), Airbnb (ABNB), Expedia Group (EXPE), and Booking Holdings (BKNG).