Dubai, United Arab Emirates, says it now has full control of the Atlantis resort hotel on Palm Jumeirah Island in Dubai, reports the Washington Post.
State-run investment firm Istithmar World said late Friday it paid $250 million to buy out financially troubled business partner Kerzner International Holdings, which held a 50% stake in the coral-colored hotel; Istithmar already owned half of the property.
Kerzner will continue to operate the resort, which includes a water park and 18 restaurants, Istithmar said.
The company agreed to give up its stake in the Dubai property and a similar resort in the Bahamas after struggling to restructure $2.6 billion in debt. Canada’s Brookfield Asset Management acquired the Bahamas property in a previously announced deal by agreeing to waive $175 million in debt owed by Kerzner.
The U.S. hotel industry recovery might have begun in 2010, but it wasn’t until 2011 that the improved prosperity was shared by nearly all hotels in the country, according to a study by PKF Hospitality Research. In 2011, 80.5% of the properties that participated in the PKF Trends in the Hotel Industry annual survey enjoyed an increase in total revenue, while nearly three-quarters (72.3%) of the participants achieved growth in profits.
“On average, hotels in the 2012 edition of Trends sample saw their profits increase by 12.7% in 2011. The good news is not isolated to a select few property categories, but rather, all hotel types were able to enjoy gains on the bottom line,” said R. Mark Woodworth, president of PKF-HR.
Resort hotels led the way with a net-operating-income gain of 18.1%, followed by full-service hotels which posted a 14.7% increase in profits. “Not surprisingly, these two property types also achieved the greatest gains in average daily room rates from 2010 to 2011,” Woodworth noted.
Lagging in profit growth were suite hotels. Both extended-stay and full-service suite hotels were unable to leverage their lofty occupancy levels into the magnitude of ADR gain required to significantly drive profitability.
Choice Hotels International announced Tuesday it opened 46 new franchised properties during the first quarter of 2012. Additionally, the company has executed a total of 64 new domestic contracts within the first quarter of 2012, a 14% increase over the same period last year.
The openings include hotels in 23 states and six additional countries including Australia, Brazil, France, Honduras, Italy and Norway, adding more than 3,800 rooms to the company's existing 495,000-plus rooms. The company previously opened a total of 256 new hotels throughout 2011.
"Despite the challenging economic climate, we've continued to be able to grow our system size and meet our development goals," said David Pepper, senior VP of global development for Choice Hotels. "Financing is slowly returning across the industry and transactions are starting to pick up as our development pipeline continues to grow."
FelCor Lodging Trust on Tuesday reported operating results for the first quarter ending 31 March.
Highlights from the earnings report include:
- Revenue per available room for 69 same-store hotels increased 3.6%. RevPAR for same-store hotels not under renovation or redevelopment increased 7.1%.
- Hotel earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization margin remained the same as the prior year at 21.8% for the quarter and increased 125 basis points for hotels not under renovation.
- Adjusted funds from operations per share were a loss of 2 cents, and Adjusted EBITDA was $41.4 million, both of which met the high end of our expectations.
- Net loss was $28.9 million.
- The company agreed to sell six non-strategic hotels for $103 million. Proceeds from the sale will be used to repay $73 million of related debt and other costs, with the remaining proceeds used to pay $30 million of accrued preferred dividends.
Marketers are used to having to prove digital advertising’s worth, but findings from Econsultancy and Google Analytics suggest the majority of marketers worldwide failed to use attribution models that properly depict the influence of each ad format and marketing channel on the consumer’s purchase path, according to an eMarketer report.
Instead, they justified and planned digital marketing investment using last-click attribution models.
The last-click attribution model was the most common method used by marketers and agencies worldwide. Under this model, the last click receives full credit for any revenue generated.
Some last-click models factor in both marketing and paid advertising influences, but under the paid search last-click model, only paid ad formats such as search and display are credited. Social media or organic search clicks do not receive credit, which makes it difficult for marketers to justify investment and spend on non-advertising marketing tactics or to know from where else they are driving purchases.
Compiled by Stephanie Wharton.
