Paris, France – 22 November 2016
China’s Jin Jiang International is looking to buy hotels in major European cities, including Paris, to expand its luxury portfolio, the chief executive of its Louvre Hotels Pierre-Frederic Roulot told Reuters.
Roulot, who oversees state-owned Jin Jiang’s expansion in Europe, said the close ties with China enjoyed by Louvre Hotels had helped it to weather an overall decline in Chinese visitors to France in 2016 due to security fears.
Jin Jiang’s strength as a powerful tour operator is also helping when foreign tourists, notably from China, have avoided France after a wave of militant Islamist attacks and repeated robberies against Asian tourists, Roulot said.
Louvre Hotels, which is the number two for budget hotels in Europe after France’s AccorHotels, will also use its alliance with China’s biggest bank card provider UnionPay to reach more of the growing number of Chinese travellers abroad.
Its hotels in France will now accept China UnionPay credit cards, further boosting its profile and responding to concerns many Chinese tourists have about not carrying too much cash in French streets due to safety fears.
Jin Jiang, one of China’s biggest hotel groups, bought Louvre Hotels in March 2015 for 1.3 billion euros as an “expansion platform” outside China, Roulot said, although he declined to comment on its push to increase its 12.6 percent stake in France’s AccorHotels.