Stock under ₹200: Yatra Online gets 'Buy' call for more than 50% upside

Stock to buy: Shares of Yatra Online, a leading online travel agency, dropped nearly 4 per cent in Monday's trade despite the frontline indices gained modestly. Yatra shares opened higher at ₹150 on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) as against the previous close of ₹147.23.

The counter made an intraday high of ₹150.89 before erasing gains and traded southward. Around 3 PM, the stock quoted 3 per cent lower at ₹ 143.05. It made a low ₹141.81.

According to NSE data, a total of 1.06 million equities changed hands at an average traded price of ₹144.84.

The scrip is in downtrend for the last three consecutive trading sessions, having lost around 10 per cent after promoter THCL Travel Holding Cyprus sold a 1.8 per cent in the open market on February 17.

 

Yatra Online share price target  

Meanwhile, Keynote Research has maintained a 'Buy' call on Yatra Online with a target price of ₹236, implying an upside of more than 50 per cent from the previous close of ₹147.23 on NSE.

Yatra in Q3FY26 posted a 17 per cent Y-o-Y decline in consolidated net profit to ₹8.3 crore while revenue from operations grew by 9 per cent on Y-o-Y basis to ₹256.8 crore. For the 9-month period (9MFY26), the travel company reported a revenue of ₹817.5 crore and its profit stood at ₹38.6 crore.

Margins to recover in Q4 

Keynote Research in its report said that EBITDA margins in Q3 stood at ~17.6 per cent, showing an increase of 460 bps on a Y-o-Y basis and decline of 136 bps on a Q-o-Q basis due to deferral of revenue on MICE segment (meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions). It expects margins to recover in Q4FY26, towards similar levels seen in H1 FY26.

The MICE business declined in the third quarter due to disruption in aviation regulations in December 2025, leading to deferred revenue of ₹30 crore along with seasonality where Q3 is leaned more towards leisure travel. The company expects this segment to recover in Q4FY26 as it is the seasonally best quarter for MICE along with 70-80 per cent of the deferred revenue will also flow in. 

Q3: 40 new corporate clients 

During the third quarter, the brokerage noted that Yatra onboarded 40 new corporate clients with a combined annual billing potential of ₹202 billion. These clients, it said, are expected to maintain a churn rate of less than 3 per cent, offering a stable base and providing strong cross-sell opportunities for other products and services.

Yatra Online: DIYA AI  

Additionally, the integration of DIYA AI will optimise the workforce headcount by 70-75 employees in the near term and up to 200 employees in the long term, further contributing to margin expansion as the company keeps onboarding corporate clients without having to significantly spend similarly on employee cost.

The brokerage noted that Yatra's management has guided for RLSC (Revenue Less Service Cost growth of ~22-23% on a Y-o-Y basis and EBITDA growth of ~37.5 per cent on a Y-o-Y basis for FY26 despite the headwinds faced in Q3FY26.

"The company has already achieved 78 per cent of its full-year RLSC target and 82 per cent of its adjusted EBITDA target, giving them confidence that they will meet their annual goals even with a moderate Q4 performance," it noted.

For FY27 and FY28, the company expects Gross Booking Value (GBV) to grow by 20 per cent, driven by a 15-20 per cent growth in the air ticketing business and ~25 per cent growth in the hotel and holiday packaging segment. The firm aims to achieve an Ebitda margin of 1.5 per cent of GBV by FY28, up from 1.2 per cent as of 9M FY26.

Yatra shares have outperformed the markets in the last one year, yielding a return of 84 per cent compared with 14 per cent rise in the headline Nifty 50 index.     ============================================  Disclaimer: View and outlook shared belong to the respective brokerages/analysts and are not endorsed by Business Standard. Readers' discretion is advised.