Tripadvisor's Chief Executive and Finance Chief Are Both Leaving as a Weak Quarter Deepens Its Overhaul

Tripadvisor said on Thursday that chief executive Matt Goldberg will leave in February, a board-led change announced alongside its third-quarter results.

Finance chief Michael Noonan will resign at the end of December, so both top jobs turn over within weeks of each other. The board has started a search for a chief executive and named an interim finance chief, but no permanent successor for either role.

Two departures on one calendar

The board determined that a leadership transition was in the best interests of the company and its shareholders, and Goldberg agreed, the company disclosed. He departs as president, chief executive and board member on February 16, 2027, and stays in the chief executive role until then to support the transition.

Noonan told the board on November 3 that he would resign to pursue another opportunity, and he stays through December 31. Kristen Dalton, the chief strategy and operations officer, becomes interim finance chief on January 1, 2027.

Dalton, 54, has worked at Tripadvisor since October 2019, when she joined as vice president of financial planning and analysis. She later ran the core Tripadvisor brand business before taking the strategy and operations role in November 2025.

Goldberg's negotiated separation agreement, signed November 4, pays him $675,000 tied to his salary and another $675,000 tied to his 2026 target bonus. Half of some unvested equity awards will vest at his departure, and the payments depend on a signed release and restrictive covenants.

The company said neither departure results from any disagreement over its operations, policies or practices. Board chair Jeremy Philips thanked both men for their leadership and for their support over the coming months.

Investors marked the stock down early

Tripadvisor shares fell about 16% in early trading on Thursday, Reuters reported. The stock had already lost about 45% of its value since Goldberg became chief executive in 2022, according to LSEG data cited by Reuters.

Goldberg succeeded founder Steve Kaufer in 2022 and repositioned the company around experiences, the tours and activities business that includes Viator. Reuters reported that activist investor Starboard Value has criticized the leadership and pushed for a review of strategic alternatives, including a possible sale.

Starboard is the company's sixth-largest shareholder, with a 4.35% stake, according to LSEG data cited by Reuters. A representative for Starboard could not be immediately reached for comment, Reuters reported.

A loss created by a write-down

Revenue from continuing operations fell 11% to $436.4 million in the quarter ended September 30. The comparison excludes TheFork, the restaurant-booking business Tripadvisor has since sold, which is now reported as discontinued operations.

The company posted a net loss of $316.9 million, or $2.70 a diluted share, against net income of $48.5 million a year earlier. The swing was driven primarily by a non-cash goodwill impairment charge of $369.5 million in the Hotels and Other segment.

Goodwill is an accounting value carried from past acquisitions, and an impairment writes that value down. Tripadvisor said the charge reflected a sustained decline in financial performance and lower forecast profitability, driven largely by faster traffic headwinds from changes in the search landscape.

Total costs and expenses rose 81% to $773.1 million, lifted by the impairment. On an adjusted basis, which strips out such charges, the company earned $0.37 a share, below the $0.44 average estimate compiled by LSEG and reported by Reuters.

Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization fell 34% to $71.1 million, or 16.3% of revenue. Cash flow from continuing operations was negative $122.0 million, against a positive $32.9 million a year earlier, and free cash flow was negative $131.2 million.

Experiences held up; hotels shrank

Experiences, the segment built around Viator, produced revenue of $284.8 million, down 3% from a year earlier. Travelers booked about 6.8 million experiences in the quarter, up about 2%, and gross bookings value was approximately flat at about $1.3 billion.

Adjusted profit for Experiences fell 27% to $38.2 million, or 13.4% of its revenue. That margin was 17.8% a year earlier, so the steadier segment still earned less on each sale.

Hotels and Other revenue fell 23% to $151.6 million. Hotel revenue and media and advertising revenue each fell 23%, to $109.7 million and $27.7 million, and other revenue fell 18% to $14.2 million.

Adjusted profit for Hotels and Other fell 41% to $32.9 million, or 21.7% of its revenue. Marketing spending was nearly flat in dollars at $213.0 million, but it consumed 48.8% of revenue, up from 43.3% a year earlier.

Sale cash, then a restructuring

Tripadvisor completed the sale of TheFork to American Express on November 1 and received net cash consideration of about $741.0 million. Management currently expects to prioritize reducing long-term debt with the proceeds, though it kept other options open.

That cash arrived after the quarter ended, so it is not inside the September 30 balance. Cash and equivalents then stood at $706.8 million, down $271.2 million from December 31, 2025, mainly after the company repaid its 2026 senior notes for $345.4 million in April.

On November 4, the company started a restructuring meant to simplify Hotels and Other, cutting roles across non-core revenue lines. It will add product, engineering and data roles to Experiences, where it wants to invest faster.

The plan is expected to save about $40 million a year before taxes, on a gross basis. The company expects $15 million to $20 million of pre-tax restructuring costs, mainly severance and mostly in the fourth quarter of 2026.

No successor and no outlook yet

No chief executive successor has been named, and the board's search firm has not been identified. There is also no permanent finance chief beyond Dalton's interim appointment, which begins in January.

The company issued no full-year outlook with the results, and it did not disclose how many roles the restructuring removes. How much of TheFork's $741.0 million ultimately goes to debt reduction is an expectation, not a committed amount.

The tests that come next

Watch the successor announcements and any response from Starboard, whose strategic-review campaign now meets a board already changing leaders. Watch, too, whether a new chief keeps the experiences-first strategy Goldberg set, or reopens the question Starboard raised.

The fourth-quarter results will show the restructuring costs landing and test whether Experiences bookings keep growing. Filings after November will show how the TheFork proceeds were actually used, starting with the debt balance.