Over the Lunar New Year holiday, Chinese travelers visited tourist hot spots across Asia, including Singapore, Thailand, and Malaysia, at numbers exceeding pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels.
Since Beijing lifted strict COVID-19 restrictions in early 2023, visa-free access for Chinese tourists to Southeast Asia countries signaled the robust recovery of the travel industry. It provided welcome relief to countries that rely on tourism from China.
In a research note, HSBC said, “Despite the macroeconomic headwinds, we believe Chinese citizens are still willing to spend on travel-related experiences, we think travel-related spending could continue to outpace this overall domestic consumption.”
According to travel website operator Trip.com, combined bookings by Chinese visitors to Singapore, Thailand, and Malaysia rose more than 30 percent from February 10 to 17 compared with 2019, and bookings to Hong Kong, Macau, Japan and South Korea also increased.
According to travel platform LY.com, visa waivers and hotel bookings for Bangkok tripled over from February 10 to 13, year-on-year, while those for Singapore jumped nine-fold.
Trip.com said that the Middle East also proved a popular Lunar New Year destination, with travel to Saudi Arabia up more than nine-fold from 2019 levels and bookings to the United Arab Emirates rising 60 percent.
In Macau, the only place in China where citizens can legally gamble in casinos, more than a million Chinese tourists visited over the holiday, with average hotel occupancy rates reaching 95 percent.
In Hong Kong, more than 1.2 million Chinese tourists were reported to have visited the city over the Lunar New Year, with hotel occupancy rates reaching 90 percent in the first few days.
South Korea’s Justice Ministry said more than 114,000 Chinese visitors entered the country during the holiday, up four percent from 2019.
