According to Zhitong Finance APP, China International Capital Corporation released a Research Report stating a Bullish outlook on the longer holiday during this year's Spring Festival for OTA platforms. The 2025 Spring Festival travel rush will start on January 14, 2025. Recently, a national teleconference on the Spring Festival travel rush released predictions for the cross-regional flow of people, and major OTA platforms also published travel forecasts for the 2025 Spring Festival. The Eve of the Spring Festival in 2025 has been included in the statutory public holidays, extending the holiday to 8 days. From the data available so far, a longer holiday allows everyone to return home and vacation at the same time, with strong demand for both domestic and cross-border travel.

China International Capital Corporation's main views are as follows:

It is expected that the cross-regional flow of people during the 2025 Spring Festival travel rush will grow steadily.

According to Xinhua News Agency, the national teleconference predicts that during the 2025 Spring Festival travel rush, the cross-regional flow of people will reach 9 billion person-times, a year-on-year increase of 7%; rail and civil aviation passenger volumes are expected to exceed 0.51 billion person-times (5% YoY) and 90 million person-times (8% YoY) respectively.

Segmented New Year celebrations, with a high proportion of family trips.

This year's 8-day Spring Festival holiday allows people to plan more leisurely between family visits and vacations. Many employees choose a leave pattern of '2 days off and 11 days rest' or '4 days off and 13 days rest,' further extending their holidays. Major OTA platforms have mentioned that traveling with family during this year's Spring Festival is a significant trend. Ctrip's '2025 Spring Festival Tourism Market Forecast Report' predicts that the proportion of family trips with children will increase to 49%, with a 75% increase in Order volume compared to the same period in 2024.

Airline ticket prices have dropped, driving demand for domestic and cross-border travel.

Flight Butler predicts that the average ticket price for economy class on domestic routes during the 2025 Spring Festival travel period (excluding tax) will decrease by 2.2% year-on-year. FlightAI estimates that overall airline ticket prices during this year's Spring Festival travel period will be about 5% lower than the same period last year, but still higher than pre-pandemic levels. Outbound ticket prices have also dropped, with regions other than Latin America seeing price reductions of over 5%. The decrease in airline ticket prices has stimulated travel demand, with Fliggy showing that reservations for hotels, flights, and package tours on its platform have significantly surpassed last year's levels, while Qunar indicated that international flight and hotel bookings during the Spring Festival have more than doubled year-on-year.

Benefiting from policy dividends, inbound tourism reservations have significantly increased.

Under the influence of the newly implemented transit visa '240' policy and the continued expansion of the 'visa-free circle' since 2024, Ctrip's platform saw a 203% year-on-year increase in inbound travel orders during the Spring Festival, with South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, and Japan being the main source markets for Ctrip, all of which are visa-free for China.

Valuation and Recommendations.

There is optimism about this year’s longer Spring Festival holiday for the growth of OTA platforms, particularly against the backdrop of traditional tourism supply chain iteration and the benefits of inbound and outbound tourism policy dividends. TRIP.COM-S (09961) and TONGCHENGTRAVEL (00780), as leading OTA platforms, are likely to benefit significantly.

Risk warning: macro consumer pressure, geopolitical risks, exchange rate fluctuations.