We recently published a list of Jim Cramer on These 7 Travel and Leisure Stocks. In this article, we are going to take a look at where United Airlines Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UAL) stands against other travel and leisure stocks that Jim Cramer discusses.
On Tuesday, Jim Cramer, the host of Mad Money, discussed the recent struggles in the travel sector and shared where he sees potential opportunities for investors.
“After weeks of carnage, we finally get a decent session thanks largely to a cooler-than-expected consumer price index rating but this is still an insanely volatile market as you know, as President Trump keeps ramping up the trade wars. Still, at this point, so many high-quality stocks have come down so much that we’re bound to find some great buying opportunities.”
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Cramer pointed to the travel sector, which had been a darling of Wall Street but has since lost much of its luster. Once considered a prime sector during the bull market, it has quickly fallen out of favor. Still, Cramer sees potential in the sector, especially for airlines, as a weaker economy is not necessarily all bad news for them. For one, he highlighted that falling oil prices could lead to significant savings on fuel costs.
Cramer said that he does not think the recent challenges facing airlines are catastrophic for the industry. With airline stocks down between 30% to 40% from their highs, he sensed an opportunity, although he cautioned investors to be selective. Furthermore, he noted that executives from top airlines have indicated that many of the industry’s structural advantages, such as reduced capacity this year, remain intact.
Cramer also turned his attention to the cruise line sector, which has experienced significant declines, with stocks for the major players down by 25% to 35% from their recent peaks. He said that he understood the reasons behind this drop. He noted that in addition to broader concerns about consumer spending, new Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick recently threatened the cruise lines with higher taxes. Cramer emphasized that many of these cruise lines are domiciled overseas and, as a result, do not pay U.S. taxes.
“Here’s the bottom line: Even with all of this trade war turmoil, I’m not ready to give up on the beaten-down travel space, which has been so good for so long and that’s why I like United Airlines, Royal Caribbean, and Airbnb. I think all are worth buying right here because it’s kind of an amazing bout of weakness after a real big run.”
Our Methodology
For this article, we compiled a list of 7 stocks that were discussed by Jim Cramer during the episode of Mad Money aired on March 12. We listed the stocks in the order that Cramer mentioned them. We also provided hedge fund sentiment for each stock as of the fourth quarter of 2024, which was taken from Insider Monkey’s database of over 1,000 hedge funds.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).
United Airlines Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UAL)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 86
Talking about United Airlines Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UAL), he said, “United said it expects its numbers to come in at the lower end of its guidance. As a result, the airline stocks were eviscerated on Tuesday.” However, Cramer pointed out that airline stocks have experienced a significant drop of 35 to 40% in recent weeks, which he views as potentially attractive for investors. Even with the steep decline, Cramer felt that the news surrounding the industry is not as negative as it appears at first glance. He went on to say:
“United stock was only down 2% yesterday after they said they’re gonna hit the lower end of the guidance… I like United, which I think has supplanted Delta as the best-run airline out there. United CEO Scott Kirby still sounded very confident in the company’s outlook at the JPMorgan conference yesterday. He said it continued strength in many parts of the business away from the weaker low-end domestic leisure market in government travel…
They also spent plenty of time explaining how they’ve pulled away from the industry in many respects when it comes to efficiency. With the stock down almost 38% from its January highs, now trading at less than six times this year’s earnings estimates, give me some. Amazing buying opportunity.”
Overall, UAL ranks 4th on our list of travel and leisure stocks that Jim Cramer discusses. While we acknowledge the potential of UAL as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than UAL but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
