Ernst and Young’s Middle East Hotel Benchmark Survey portrayed a 51% hotel occupancy rate in Lebanon for the month of November. This rate represented an increase of 4 percentage points (p.p) from the same period in 2013. In contrast, the Average Room Rate (ARR) posted a 1.8% annual decline to $160, while the Revenue per Average Room (RevPAR) gained 6.4% year-on-year (y-o-y) to $83. The occupancy rate is expected to show a bigger progress next month, as hotels usually see rises in bookings over the holidays. On a cumulative basis, Lebanon’s hotel occupancy rate also stood at 51%, a decline of 1 p.p from the same period last year. The ARR and RevPAR also posted year-to-date (y-t-d) downticks of 3.5% and 4.9% to $162 and $83, respectively. Regionally, Riyadh and Cairo improved the most during the first 11 months of 2014 as the former saw several events taking place during the period while the latter benefited from improvement on the security and political fronts. The two cities’ occupancy rates yearly rose by 9 p.p each by November to 34% and 66%, respectively. The RevPAR for the same period increased in both Cairo and Riyadh by 47.2% and 12.7% to respective values of $31 and $143. However, the ARRs in the respective cities followed differing trends, with Cairo’s ARR improving by 11.8% y-o-y to $92, while that of Riyadh lost an annual 2.4% to $214. Meanwhile, Kuwait was the worst performer during November, with occupancy rates dropping by an annual 11 p.ps to 48%. Consequently, the RevPAR lost 11.5% to $146, while the ARR rose by 7.8% annually to $299.