Citigroup: Passenger volume during the first 17 days of the Spring Festival travel season increased by 4% year-on-year. Maintains a "buy" rating on TONGCHENGTRAVEL (00780).

Citigroup released a research report stating that they maintain a "buy" rating for Trip.com Group Ltd. Sponsored ADR (TCOM.US) and TONGCHENGTRAVEL (00780), with a target price of $82 for Trip.com Group Ltd. Sponsored ADR and HK$28 for Tongcheng Travel H shares. However, the bank believes that the stock price of Trip.com Group Ltd. Sponsored ADR is unlikely to fluctuate due to the Chinese New Year data, as the market regulator is still conducting an investigation. Trip.com Group Ltd. Sponsored ADR will announce its performance after the U.S. market closes on February 25th. The Ministry of Transport announced that the total passenger throughput for the first 17 days of the Spring Festival travel season (February 2 to March 13) increased by 4% compared to the same period last year, with railway, civil aviation, road, and waterway transportation increasing by 2.8%, 5.2%, 4%, and 18.4% respectively. In the first 4 days of the 9-day Spring Festival holiday, the total passenger throughput increased by 6.8% compared to the previous year, with railway, civil aviation, road, and waterway transportation increasing by 3.5%, 7.7%, 6.8%, and 26.9% respectively. The bank believes that the national passenger throughput data is generally in line with expectations, with civil aviation and road transportation performing better than expected, but railway data is slightly weaker, possibly due to base comparison issues. In terms of outbound travel, the National Immigration Administration estimates that the average daily cross-border passenger volume during the 9-day holiday period will reach 2.05 million, an increase of 14.1% compared to the previous year. This still requires observation, as immigration authorities' pre-holiday forecasts are typically overly optimistic and are also influenced by incidents such as those in Japan.