Chinese visitor arrivals, expenditure foreseen to rise for Malaysia

"Coupled with the potentially 60 percent more Chinese visitors in 2025, Chinese tourism expenditure in Malaysia could double to more than 30 billion ringgit in 2025 vis-a-vis 2019," Maybank Investment said.

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct. 19 (Xinhua) -- A Malaysian research house has seen Malaysia as a big winner in the race for Chinese tourists, with Chinese visitor arrivals to surge to 5 million, and Chinese tourism expenditure to surge to more than 30 billion ringgit (6.97 billion U.S. dollars) next year.

Maybank Investment said in a note on Friday that its channel checks reveal that the recent summer holidays saw Chinese visitor arrivals exceeding even pre-pandemic levels.

"We estimate that Chinese visitor arrivals may surge to 5 million in 2025 (60 percent more than 2019) and Chinese tourism expenditure may also surge to more than 30 billion ringgit (two times of 2019)," the research house said.

According to the research house, Malaysia and Singapore have emerged as winners in the post-pandemic race for Chinese visitors, thanks in large part to the waiver of visa requirements for Chinese visitors.

It noted that in September, seat capacity from China to Malaysia hit 123 percent of pre-pandemic levels while seat capacity from China to Singapore hit 118 percent of pre-COVID levels.

"We observe Chinese visitation to Singapore because a third of all Chinese visitors to Malaysia enter by land from Singapore as part of 'Xin-Ma-Tai' (Singapore-Malaysia-Thailand) tours," it said.

Maybank Investment also noticed that most of the growth in seat capacity from China to Malaysia was driven by Chinese carriers instead of Malaysian ones.

Annualizing the September 2024 seat capacity from China to Malaysia of 419,153 and assuming 80 percent load factor, it gathered that Malaysia may welcome 4 million Chinese visitors by air in 2025.

Coupled with the 1.1 million Chinese visitors who entered Malaysia from Singapore by land in 2019, it believes it's probable that Chinese visitor arrivals to Malaysia could hit 5 million in 2025.

"Tourism Malaysia is targeting 5 million Chinese visitors to Malaysia, albeit lower this year (2.3 million from January to August in 2024). If this were to materialize, Malaysia may welcome a whopping 60 percent more Chinese visitors in 2025 than it did in 2019," it added.

According to Maybank Investment, Chinese visitors to Malaysia are actually spending more vis-a-vis pre-pandemic times.

It noted that in the second half of 2024, the average tourism expenditure per Chinese visitor was 27 percent higher than in 2019.

"Coupled with the potentially 60 percent more Chinese visitors in 2025, Chinese tourism expenditure in Malaysia could double to more than 30 billion ringgit in 2025 vis-a-vis 2019," it said. ■