The NZ Herald is reporting that travel stocks plummeted across the board following the U.S. State Department's worldwide travel alert for U.S. citizens, citing current information that suggests ISIL (aka Da’esh), al-Qa’ida, Boko Haram, and other terrorist groups continue to plan terrorist attacks in multiple regions.
Air New Zealand shares fell as much as 2.87 percent during trading Monday, with Qantas down more than two percent, Cathay Pacific down 1.46 percent and China Southern Airlines down 2.86 percent.
Chris Roberts, CEO of Tourism Industry Association New Zealand, said given all the new air services between the U.S. and New Zealand, they expected to see an increase in U.S. visitor arrivals, according to the NZ Herald.
In the year to August, 236,272 Americans visited New Zealand, an 11.2 percent increase over the previous year, and roughly 80 percent of them arrived at Auckland Airport.
Normally one of the most visited cities in the world, Paris has seen a decline in new flight bookings by more than 25 percent in the week following attacks there that killed 130 people, according to the report.
According to the report, New Zealand had a large number of American tourists coming into the country on a fairly regular basis, and that if the US was putting out alerts to reduce travel then this would have an effect on the payloads for airlines like Air New Zealand.
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