Shanghai-headquartered hotel giant H World Group said its hotel network in operation totaled 8,402 hotels and 797,489 rooms as of the end of September this year, including 126 hotels from its German subsidiary Deutsche Hospitality.
Hotel turnover increased 24.4% year-over-year to RMB 15.2 billion in the third quarter of 2022. Excluding the DH unit, hotel turnover increased 21.6%.
Revenue increased 16.2% year-over-year to RMB 4.1 billion (USD 575 million) in the third quarter. Revenue from the Legacy-Huazhu segment in the third quarter rose 7.7% year-over-year.
Net loss attributable to H World Group was RMB 717 million (USD 101 million) in the third quarter, compared with RMB 137 million in the same quarter last year. Net loss attributable to H World Group from the Legacy-Huazhu segment was RMB 731 million in the third quarter.
RevPAR for Legacy-Huazhu was RMB 193 in the third quarter of 2022, compared with RMB 177 in the third quarter of 2021, and RMB 215 in the third quarter of 2019.
RevPAR for Legacy-DH was EUR 75 in the third quarter of 2022, compared with EUR 48 in the third quarter of 2021.
Jin Hui, CEO of H World commented: "During the third quarter of 2022, our RevPAR recovered to 90% of the 2019 level, thanks to the pent-up leisure travel demand in the summer holiday during July and August 2022, as well as a gradual recovery of business travel in late September 2022. However, given more sporadic resurgences of COVID in various Chinese cities and provinces since early October, our October RevPAR recovery slowed down to only 74% of 2019 level."
"Our near-term focus will remain on cost control and prudent capex spending to ensure the company’s operational and cash flow safety. More importantly, we are continuously optimizing our organizational structure and improving hotel and service quality to further strengthen our long-term core competencies, which is the critical foundation for us to achieve our long-term ‘Sustainable Quality Growth’ strategy."
"In Europe, the DH business further improved in the third quarter with RevPAR recovering to 102% of the 2019 level, from 93% in the second quarter. The recovery was mainly driven by 17% ADR growth. This upward trend continued in October. However, against the background of surging inflation in Europe due to energy shortages, cash flow improvement program remains critical. Therefore, DH’s near-term focus will remain on efficiency improvements, renegotiation of further lease waivers, and personnel cost optimization."
In the fourth quarter of 2022, H World expects revenue to increase 7% to 11% compared to the fourth quarter of 2021, or to decrease 1% to 5% if excluding DH.
