The average occupancy rate of Macau hotels and guesthouses fell 6 percentage points year-on-year in July, to 80.6 percent. During the period the average length of stay was 1.4 nights, an improvement of 0.1 nights on July 2014, according to data from Macau’s Statistics and Census Service carrying Monday’s date.
A total of 978,000 visitors in July checked into hotels and guesthouses, an improvement of 4.6 percent year-on-year. Such overnight guests represented 36.9 percent of Macau’s 2.65 million visitor arrivals in July.
Macau hotel guests originating from Hong Kong rose by 44.6 percent year-on-year in July, while those from mainland China decreased by 1.1 percent.
Macau’s cumulative hotel occupancy rate for the first seven months of 2015 was 78.5 percent, a decline of 7.5 percentage points judged year-on-year.
The hotel segment experiencing the biggest year-on-year decline in occupancy – on a cumulative basis for the calendar year to July 31 – was the four-star category, where occupancy fell to 77.3 percent, down 9.7 percentage points year-on-year.
Carlo Santarelli, an analyst at Deutsche Bank AG, said in a note on July 31 that Macau’s hotel occupancy trends in the second quarter – judged year-on-year – had been “daunting”.
“Occupancy levels have fallen 650 bps [basis points], 670 bps, and 1,060 bps in April, May, and June, respectively,” wrote Mr Santarelli.
Approximately 82 percent of the 12,500 new hotel rooms currently under construction in Macau are on Cotai, according to other government data recently published. So far on Cotai, all the existing hotel rooms are in the four-star, five-star or five-star deluxe category, according to the Macau Government Tourist Office website.
However it was the budget two-star hotel category that saw the biggest year-on-year decline in occupancy in July, down 11.4 percentage points, to 66.0 percent, according to the data released on Monday. Such properties are mostly on Macau peninsula.
The decline in occupancy at two-star properties coincided with a 22.3 percent fall year-on-year in July in the number of generally low-spending package tour visitors to Macau. Such visitors amounted to 820,000 arrivals. Not all package tour visitors stay overnight.
The tally of package tour visitors from mainland China in July fell 19.1 percent year-on-year. In the first seven months, visitors on package tours totalled 5.76 million arrivals, down by 2.9 percent year-on-year, said the statistics service.
