By Bloomberg News | Updated on Oct 10, 2026 at 01:44 AM
Chinese tourists scaled back spending during this month’s extended public holiday, highlighting the persistent weakness of domestic demand in an economy that’s relied heavily on exports for growth.
Tourists made more than 820 million domestic trips during the weeklong National Day holiday and total expenditure exceeded 738 billion yuan ($110 billion), the Ministry of Culture and Tourism said in a statement published Friday.
That points to spending per trip of about 894 yuan, less than the 916 yuan recorded in 2024 when the break also lasted seven days, according to Bloomberg calculations based on the official data. Last year the holiday stretched for eight days because it was combined with the Mid-Autumn Festival, and per-trip spending was 911 yuan.
The numbers reinforce earlier reports of flat passenger traffic for the holiday period and slumping box office receipts amid a lack of blockbuster movies. It all adds to the picture of stagnant consumer spending in the world’s second-largest economy, where a real estate downturn continues to weigh on household finances and the unemployment rate has been inching up.
“The gap between solid passenger flows and weak per-capita spending persisted,” Goldman Sachs Group Inc. economists led by Yuting Yang said in a note. They estimate domestic tourism revenue per traveler is still 4.5% below its pre-pandemic level, “signaling continued consumption downgrading.”
Despite repeated pledges to expand domestic demand, the government has offered no major new measures to encourage spending in 2026, and the impact of its longstanding program to spur purchases of household goods with subsidies is waning.
Investment has also been contracting, leaving the economy ever more dependent on exports. The authorities put investment at the center of a mini-stimulus package unveiled late last month, and they’ve also started offering mortgage subsidies to some households in an effort to stabilize the property market.
“Recent policy communications suggest that policymakers continue to prioritize high-tech industries and investment — particularly the ‘ Six Networks ’ projects — over consumption,” Goldman’s economists said. “We therefore maintain our view that any incremental consumption stimulus is likely to be modest in scale.”