China News Service, Beijing, February 18th: Three hot markets “ignite” China’s Spring Festival economy

　　China News Service reporter Wang Enbo

　　The 2024 Chinese New Year holiday has officially come to an end. During this eight-day "extended" holiday (February 10-17), the popularity of the three markets soared, "igniting" China's Spring Festival economy.

Data map: The picture shows tourists visiting the Palace Museum in Beijing during the Spring Festival holiday on February 17. Photo by China News Service reporter Jia Tianyong

The tourism market is in full swing

　　474 million people traveled, spending 632.687 billion yuan (RMB, the same below)! This is the "battle report" of China's domestic tourism during the Spring Festival holiday.

　　The above two data increased by 34.3% and 47.3% respectively year-on-year, and on a comparable basis compared with the same period in 2019, they increased by 19.0% and 7.7% respectively, which can be said to be full of firepower.

　　The rising demand for travel has led to booming business on online travel platforms. During the Spring Festival holiday, ticket orders for domestic scenic spots on the Ctrip platform increased by more than 60% year-on-year, and ticket orders for overseas scenic spots increased by more than 130% compared with the 2019 Spring Festival. The number of domestic travel bookings during the holidays on the Fliggy platform also significantly exceeded the same period in 2019, with medium and long-term travel more than three times year-on-year; outbound travel has reached a peak in the past four years, with bookings increasing nearly 10 times year-on-year.

　　Cultural tourism in various places, which has been booming a few years ago, will reap huge rewards this Spring Festival. In the first five days of the holiday alone, the city of Harbin, which enjoys top-notch ice and snow, received a total of 6.298 million tourists, a year-on-year increase of 82.9%. The warm south is also attractive. During the Spring Festival holiday, Guangdong Province received a total of 76.069 million tourists and achieved tourism revenue of 69.36 billion yuan; Fujian Province received 32.5747 million tourists and achieved tourism revenue of 27.718 billion yuan, both reaching record highs.

Data map: The picture shows a cinema in Ganzhou, Jiangxi. People collect tickets from the self-service ticket machine. Photo by Liu Lixin

The movie market is booming during the Spring Festival

　　8.016 billion yuan! This is the box office performance of Chinese movies during the 2024 Spring Festival holiday. It increased by 18.47% compared to the same period last year, making it the strongest Spring Festival period in history.

　　Previously, due to the lack of "heavy industry movies" with high investment and large production like last year's "The Wandering Earth 2", the industry was once cautiously optimistic about the box office of this year's Spring Festival. However, the reputation of many comedy films that have a wide audience range, good viewing effects, and are suitable for family viewing continues to grow, attracting a large number of Chinese people to go to the cinema with their families.

　　In the end, a total of 163 million people watched the movie during the Spring Festival this year, a significant increase of 26.36% over last year, setting a new record high for the same period. "It's Hot", "Flying Life 2" and "Bear Infested: Reversal of Time" are among the top three box office releases in the schedule, and they have all received good reputations. The top two Spring Festival box office sales have both exceeded the 2 billion yuan mark.

　　It is worth mentioning that various localities have launched cultural subsidy policies to benefit the people, and added film studio ticket subsidy, making this year’s Spring Festival movie ticket prices much cheaper. According to data from multiple movie analysis platforms, the average ticket price for this year’s Spring Festival is less than 50 yuan, which is significantly lower than last year and the same period the year before last. This has also become a major factor in people’s preference for watching movies during the New Year.

　　According to the National Film Administration, as of 9:30 on February 18, China's box office for the whole of 2024 has reached 11.081 billion yuan. The industry is optimistic that the "good start" during the Spring Festival will drive the recovery of the movie-going market throughout the year.

Consumer market vitality emerges

　　2.4 billion yuan! This is the tax-free Spring Festival holiday consumption bill for the outlying islands of Hainan. Compared with the Spring Festival holiday in 2023 (a total of seven days, one day less than this year), the shopping amount this year increased by nearly 60%.

　　The Spring Festival is the sales peak for duty-free sales in Hainan Islands. Many stores launch activities such as full-site discounts, instant bank discounts, and no-threshold coupons. Yang Yiqian, sales manager of the operation and management department of Sanya Hailv Duty Free City, said that the store's customer traffic has continued to rise since the beginning of this month, and the customer traffic during this year's Spring Festival is higher than last year. According to statistics, during the eight-day holiday, the number of duty-free shoppers on Hainan's outlying islands reached 297,700, with per capita consumption of 8,358 yuan.

　　Not only is high-end consumption picking up, mass consumption in various places is also quite active. From February 9 to 16, Shanghai’s online and offline consumption amounted to 56.9 billion yuan, and the total offline passenger flow monitored in 35 business districts was 28.73 million. During the Spring Festival holiday, enterprises in department stores, supermarkets, specialty stores, catering and e-commerce businesses monitored by the Beijing Municipal Commerce Bureau achieved sales of 7.74 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 36.8% and an increase of 64.1% compared with 2019.

　　Market sales continue to pick up during the Spring Festival, giving China a good start for consumption this year. Ding Shuang, chief economist of Standard Chartered Bank's Greater China and North Asia region, said that in the third and fourth quarters of last year, the year-on-year growth rate of Chinese residents' per capita consumption expenditure exceeded the growth rate of income, which means that people are willing to use excess savings for consumption. This year's policies will continue to promote reasonable economic growth, helping to improve employment and income expectations. Consumption is expected to continue to be the largest contributor to China's economic growth. (over)