Living true to its name, the hospitality sector provided some succour to the bruised bulls on Dalal Street on Friday. Most of the hotel
stocks hit their 52-week high on the back of news that hotels have hiked or mulling an increase in room tariffs for the busy season from October to March.
Some luxury hotels have hiked room rentals by between 10% and 20% depending on the location of their properties. Stocks of Asian Hotels, EIH Associated Hotels, Taj GVK Hotels and ITC (a substantial portion of the tobacco major's income comes from hotels business) hit their 52-week high. Asian recorded a new peak of Rs 408, EIH Associated scaled Rs 125.50, while Taj GVK and ITC touched Rs 148.70 and Rs 255 respectively before retracting at close.
"There has been marginal month-on-month improvement in both occupancies and average room rentals (ARRs). Indicators like advance bookings have begun to show some positive trends, but it's still early to call an inflection point," Jamshed Dadabhoy and Aditya Mathur, analysts with Citigroup, said in a note on ITC. "Certain properties have exhibited 80-100% occupancies, but for the business in its entirety, occupancies still remain fairly lacklustre on a year-on-year basis."
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