Paris travel bookings down after attacks

The report said current cancellations and bookings have recovered to normal levels, but arrivals for the Christmas period are “worrisome”, with bookings 13% down on a year ago.

Heightened travel risks stemming from the recent militant attacks in Paris have depressed flight bookings to the French capital and other destinations, sending travel stocks lower as fears grow of a lengthy slump.

The Paris attacks saw terrorists kill 130 people across a number of sites in the city.

ForwardKeys monitors future travel patterns by analysing 14 million reservation transactions each day.

Nevertheless, Fankhauser said that he was hopeful that business would rebound fairly quickly.

Data provided by travel information group ForwardKeys revealed that customers booking flights to Paris dropped by 27pc between November 14 and 21 compared to the same period previous year.

“Companies are hitting the pause button on travel” and telling employees they can choose not to go.

Valencia, Spain-based travel data analyst ForwardKeys reported a “159% drop” in flight bookings to Brussels since the start of last weekend.

France is the world’s biggest vacation destination, leaving it vulnerable to changes in consumer behaviour.

Low-priced carrier easyJet said on Tuesday it had seen a “cooling off” in demand for travel to France.

Just last week, tourism-related stocks fell sharply, but companies said it was too early to measure the impact of the attacks.

Although cancellations have now levelled out, overall bookings remain down. Air France (AIRF.PA) was down 3.9 percent and easyjet down 3.2 percent.

Olivier Jager, chief executive of ForwardKeys, said: “The clear picture to emerge from our data is that there were dramatic last-minute cancellations of immediate travel plans, predominantly among business travellers, following the attacks”.