Hotel rates: in Asia, prices often vary

Floating economy + Fukushima effect: the average room rate in Asia has been experiencing chaotic, and sometimes contradictory, changes over the last few months. These are the findings of a survey of hotel rates in Asia published in mid-September by the online booking centre HRS.  

Between March and September 2011, trends in Japan were, of course, particularly contrasted between the sharp fall in rates seen in Tokyo (-11?%) and Kyoto (-12?%) and the sharp rise recorded in Osaka (+50?%), a refuge city far from the epicentre of the earthquake. Behind Japan, other Asian countries saw their hotel rates fall over the same period, with particularly significant falls in Kuala Lumpur (-11?%), Beijing and Shanghai (-9?%), Seoul , Bangkok and Hanoi. This analysis is confirmed by hotels.com's latest HPI study, which notes that "the average price of a hotel night fell by 6?% in the Asia-Pacific region between the first half of 2010 and the first half of 2011".