November tourist arrivals exceeded 2.08 million, up 1% on the same month last year, the Tourism Board says. The total number of arrivals from January to November rose 8% to more than 22.84 million.

More than 1.29 million arrivals (62.4%) stayed in the city for at least one night in November, with the remainder, 783,000 or 37.6%, classified as same-day in-town visitors.

Arrivals from key regional source markets all registered increases, except the Mainland which fell 2.5% to 1,043,726 and South and Southeast Asia which dropped 3.5% to 240,236.

Visitors from Taiwan rose 0.4% to 167,346; North Asia (188,920, up 12.3%); Europe, Africa and the Middle East (188,630, up 15.4%); the Americas (155,463, up 2.5%); and Australia, New Zealand and the South Pacific (54,632, up 7.7%).

Mainland visitors represented 50.1% of the arrivals. Of these, 483,082 travelled under the Individual Visit Scheme, 46.5% of the Mainland total and 8.7% more than the same month last year.

Hotel occupancy was 90%, five percentage points lower than the same month last year. This can be partly explained by the 3.5% rise in Hong Kong's hotel-room supply in the intervening 12 months.