Royal Caribbean plans to resume cruises from the Bahamas

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Royal Caribbean Group,

which has closed most of its cruises over the past year due to the pandemic, plans to resume some trips from the Bahamas in June with adult passengers and crew vaccinated against Covid, the company has announced.

Royal Caribbean (ticker: RCL) will use Nassau in the Bahamas as the port of origin for the seven-night cruises, which will be scheduled between June and August.

They would be the first crossings to the most important Caribbean market for the Miami-based company in more than a year. Most cruise companies have been closed for about a year due to the pandemic, which caused billions of dollars in losses and huge capital increases to bolster their balance sheets.

Royal Caribbean has made some voyages outside Singapore and, through a joint venture, from Europe.

Royal Caribbean and its two main US partners –

Carnival

(CCL) i

Norway Cruise Line Holdings

(NCLH): They are waiting for more guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on when they came to resume shipping outside U.S. ports.

However, Nassau cruises offer some possible clues as to what navigation will be like when cruises resume.

The new itineraries “will be available for adult guests who are fully vaccinated against Covid-19 and those under 18 with negative test results,” according to a statement released by Royal Caribbean on Friday, adding that crews will also be vaccinated.

In the statement, Michael Bayley, President and CEO of Royal Caribbean International, said: “We believe that starting with cruises for vaccinated adults and crew is the right choice. As we move forward, we expect this requirement and other measures to evolve. inevitably over time “.

Trips are expected to include Perfect Day stops at CocoCay, a private island in the Bahamas developed by Royal Caribbean; Grand Bahama Island and Cozumel, Mexico.

Shares of Royal Caribbean have risen 21% to date, as investors grow increasingly confident of a wider reopening of the economy. Lately, there has been more optimism among Wall Street analysts about the outlook for the industry.

Still, Royal and his colleagues have been burning hundreds of millions of troops each month while their fleets are inactive.

The company had an adjusted loss of $ 18.31 per share in 2020, compared to a profit of $ 9.54 the previous year.

Write to Lawrence C. Strauss at [email protected]