What Does This Mean For Cruise Lines

Congress has passed the Alaska Tourism Recovery Act, which basically exempts the cruise lines from the Passenger Vessel Services Act and will allow cruises from Alaska this summer. Alaska cruises usually are required (under the Passenger Vessel Services Act or PVSA) to stop in Canada -- but Canada is not allowing ships from the US into Canadian waters, so today’s news suggests the cruise lines can skip that Canadian stop, so that would remove a hurdle that is specific to Alaska cruises.

Typically Alaska has a May-Sept season, so this year may be less than half of a season, and at lower occupancies. We believe the news is a positive because we think the next meaningful catalyst for the cruise lines will be ships sailing out of the US in July -- the first time in about 16 months -- if that does happen in July.

Final approval from the CDC is still needed, but it sounds as if significant progress has been made in reaching those terms.

The CDC is close to allowing vaccinated cruises to start out of the US, so they would allow wherever the cruise lines have port agreements. But reminder that the governor of Florida is blocking any business that tries to require or ask for proof of vaccines, so the state and the CDC will be arbitrating that by June 1^st.