TripAdvisor Bulls Could Have Their Patience Tested, Says Oppenheimer

Tripadvisor Inc TRIP's stock was trading lower by nearly 8 percent Thursday morning after the company's second-quarter earnings print fell short of expectations on both the top and bottom line.

Following the earnings print, Jed Kelly, an online travel analyst at Oppenheimer, commented that TripAdvisor's free cash flow appears to be "strong," but management's cautious tone "clouds near-term visibility."

Related Link: TripAdvisor Misses EPS And Sales Estimates, Shares Fall 6%

Specifically, TripAdvisor has become incrementally cautious around its outlook for the bottom half of 2016 given recent macro events and the company's lower variable marketing channel share could be weighing on hotel shopper growth.

As such, the Street's expectations for a revenue growth of 11 percent year-over-year in the back half of 2016 appear "aggressive."

"TRIP shares continue to show resiliency, but we believe the potential of increasing marketing investments to drive traffic and change user behavior could test the bulls' patience," the analyst wrote.

Although, the bulls do have contend with the stock's 25 percent decline since the start of 2016 and an 18 percent decline over the past year.

Kelly's Perform rating is under review, as the note was written prior to TripAdvisor's 8:30 a.m. ET conference call to discuss its quarterly results.

Full ratings data available on Benzinga Pro.