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Source: Times Finance Author: Lin Xinlin

In 2024, the cultural and tourism market will remain hot.

Image source: Tuchong Creative

The internet celebrity city of Zibo remains popular, and Harbin and Altay have taken over as the top cities.

However, for the scenic spot company that just made a comeback last year, this year has not been easy.

According to the half-year performance forecast that has been disclosed, Changbai Mountain (603099.SH) is expected to record a net profit of 20 million to 23 million yuan in the first half of the year, an increase of 63.27% to 87.76% year-on-year. However, a number of listed scenic spots such as Qujiang Culture Tourism (600706.SH), Guilin Tourism (000978.SZ), Xi'an Tourism (000610.SZ), and Zhangjiajie (000430.SZ) have turned from profit to loss or their losses have widened.

Performance of scenic spots diverges, with Changbai Mountain experiencing the strongest growth

Harbin's boom has driven the continued rise in ice and snow tourism. Last year, Changbai Mountain achieved a revenue of 620 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 218.73%; net profit was 138 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 340.59%, ending three consecutive years of losses and recording the best performance since its listing.

This year, Changbai Mountain continues to maintain its popularity. In the first half of the year, it is expected to achieve revenue of 255 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 51.8%; net profit is 20 million yuan to 23 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 63.27% to 87.76%.

Changbai Mountain pointed out that the increase in performance was mainly due to the increase in the number of tourists. The Changbai Mountain Management Committee disclosed that as of the end of May, the main scenic area of ​​Changbai Mountain received a total of 745,000 tourists this year, a year-on-year increase of 99.5%.

Its performance in the capital market has also been rising. At the beginning of this year, Changbaishan hit a historical high of 40.45 yuan per share during intraday trading, with a market value of over 10 billion yuan. As of the close of July 17, Changbaishan's share price was 21.62 yuan, with a cumulative increase of 50.99% since the beginning of the year, a change from the stock price of less than 10 yuan in the past few years.

A person from a listed travel company told Times Finance that Changbai Mountain's customer acquisition is expected to have considerable room for growth in the next two years. "Many people are waiting for the opening of the Shenyang-Baishan high-speed railway. After its opening, it will only take 4 hours from Beijing to Changbai Mountain, which will boost the source of customers from Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei." He pointed out that Changbai Mountain's "turnaround" mainly relies on improving transportation, optimizing business structure, enriching ice and snow tourism products, and constantly blurring the boundaries between traditional peak and off-seasons.

In addition to Changbai Mountain, Sante Cableway (002159.SZ), which operates passenger cableway transportation in scenic areas, and Dalian Shengya (600593.SH), which mainly builds and operates aquariums, also achieved profitability. The former recorded a net profit of 60 million to 90 million yuan, an increase of 18% to 77% year-on-year; the latter is expected to record a net profit of 10.15 million to 15.23 million yuan, a decrease of 21% to 47% year-on-year.

Unlike Changbai Mountain's strong growth, the performance of several companies in the first half of this year showed signs of decline.

The three tourist attraction companies, Qujiang Culture Tourism, Guilin Tourism, and Tibet Tourism (600749.SH), are all expected to record losses, among which Qujiang Culture Tourism has the largest loss, and its net profit attributable to the parent is expected to be a loss of 150 million to 180 million yuan in the first half of 2024.

Zhangjiajie, Xi'an Tourism, and Yunnan Tourism (002059.SZ) continued to suffer losses. Among them, Zhangjiajie is expected to record a loss of 58 million yuan to 63 million yuan, an increase of 41% to 53% year-on-year; Xi'an Tourism recorded a loss of 51 million yuan to 69.6 million yuan, an increase of 1.5% to 39% year-on-year.

Regarding the decline in performance, many scenic spot companies mentioned the impact of reduced passenger flow.

Tibet Tourism said in its performance loss forecast announcement that in the first half of 2024, domestic tourism tended to normalize, and inbound and outbound tourism showed a clear recovery trend, which had a certain substitution effect on the domestic long-distance tourism market. The overall number of tourists received by the scenic spot in the first half of the year was basically the same as the same period last year. Zhangjiajie also mentioned in its previous quarterly report that the main reason for the increase in losses compared with the same period last year was the decrease in the number of ticket buyers received in this period.

Huangshan Tourism also previously disclosed that its net profit in the first quarter of this year was 25 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of more than 60%. The decline in profits was mainly due to the decrease in the number of effective ticket purchases.

Affected by bad debts and provisions, Zhangjiajie and Qujiang Cultural Tourism continued to lose money

In addition to the impact of passenger flow, some scenic spot companies' performance was dragged down by factors such as project investment returns falling short of expectations and accounts receivable becoming bad debts.

In addition, in recent years, scenic spot companies have begun to explore incremental business, get rid of over-reliance on traditional passenger transport business, and transform from sightseeing tours to leisure and vacation tours. However, due to the incubation period or the market response is not as expected, it also has an impact on the performance of listed companies.

Xi'an Tourism pointed out that the company's expected loss in the first half of 2024 is mainly due to the fact that the company's newly expanded hotel stores are still in the ramp-up period or have not yet opened, and the rigid fixed costs are high. Mount Emei also mentioned in its financial report that the performance of its performance project "Only Mount Emei" did not meet expectations, and the project company Yunshang Travel Investment lost 228 million yuan last year.

As one of the few scenic spot companies that failed to turn losses into profits last year, Zhangjiajie's losses have further widened this year, with the main reason still being the "difficult" Dayong Ancient City.

In the first half of 2024, Zhangjiajie expects the Dayong Ancient City project to lose 64 million yuan. In 2023, due to depreciation and amortization and financial expenses of Dayong Ancient City Company, the Dayong Ancient City project has already recorded a loss of 249 million yuan.

On one hand, there are long-term depreciation and amortization, and on the other hand, Dayong Ancient City has not yet been officially fully operational due to issues such as investment attraction. Previously, a representative of Zhangjiajie Securities said that they are still trying their best to find partners, and the internal issue of the project's revenue is also "very urgent." In April last year, Zhangjiajie reached a cooperation agreement with Dalian Wanda Group to cooperate in investment attraction and operation around the Dayong Ancient City project, but the cooperation agreement later expired.

Xi'an's Qujiang Culture Tourism fell into a loss-making situation due to bad debts in accounts receivable.

With the operating rights of popular scenic spots such as the Tang Dynasty Everbright City and the Tang Paradise, Qujiang Tourism Group is not worried about the flow of tourists. The financial report shows that in 2023, the scenic spot operation and management business accounted for about 64.18% of the 1.5 billion yuan revenue of Qujiang Tourism Group. Since the beginning of this year, there have been many discussions on social platforms about the large flow of tourists to the Tang Dynasty Everbright City.

Qujiang Culture and Tourism said that the reason for the expected loss in the first half of the year was that the expected credit loss model for accounts receivable in this period changed compared with the same period last year, resulting in an increase in the amount of bad debt provisions.

In fact, in 2023, Qujiang Tourism's performance has already changed, and the company recorded a loss for the whole year due to an increase of about 192 million yuan in bad debts. As of the end of 2023, Qujiang Tourism's accounts receivable reached 1.455 billion yuan, of which 422 million yuan was bad debt reserves, with a book value of 1.033 billion yuan, accounting for 28.38% of the company's total assets.

According to the financial report, the main debtor of accounts receivable, Xi'an Qujiang New District Business Asset Management Center, is the entrustor of core scenic spots such as Datang Furong Garden and Datang Never Sleeps City Scenic Spot, and is a public institution under Qujiang New District Management Committee, the actual controller of Qujiang Culture and Tourism. Previously, Qujiang Culture and Tourism responded to the Shanghai Stock Exchange regarding the huge amount of accounts receivable, saying that there was no credit risk on the debtor, and promised to strengthen communication and consultation with these units to increase collection efforts.

The large amount of bad debts not only dragged down the company's performance, but also affected the stock price performance of the former "monster stock". Since April, the stock price of Qujiang Culture and Tourism has been fluctuating and falling. As of the closing price on July 17, it was 9.14 yuan per share, with a cumulative decline of nearly 38% this year.

In addition, in April this year, Qujiang Culture and Tourism issued an announcement stating that it had received a "Notice of Case Filing" and a "Notice of Detention" issued by the Shangluo City Shangzhou District Supervisory Committee, detaining the company's chairman Geng Lin; in June this year, due to the company's performance forecast disclosed in the parent's net profit and net profit after deducting non-recurring items disclosed and the annual report data There were large differences, Qujiang Culture and Tourism and Geng Lin received a warning letter from the Shaanxi Securities Regulatory Bureau.

Since the beginning of this year, the tourism industry as a whole has entered a normal state. An unnamed tourism practitioner told Times Finance that after experiencing the "retaliatory growth" in 2023, the hotel accommodation industry and the cruise industry both showed a significant decline in the first half of the year, and "this summer vacation is a big challenge for the tourism industry."

In a recent research report, PuRong International pointed out that in the first half of 2024, the hotel industry will be under pressure from bad weather, consumer budget cuts, hotel price competition and high base, and occupancy rates and average room rates will be under pressure.

The above-mentioned practitioners pointed out that the problem of rising travel prices this year may be alleviated compared with previous years. At present, there is insufficient momentum for price increases in air tickets and high-end star-rated hotels. On July 15, data provided by Qunar showed that this year's summer travel market showed a trend of "increasing volume and falling prices". As of now, the average price paid for domestic air tickets during the summer has dropped by 6% compared with the same period last year.