According to official statistics from the Chinese Communist Party, during the 2025 National Day holiday in China, domestic travel increased, but the average daily spending per person decreased by 13% to 113.88 yuan compared to the previous year. The box office revenue for movies and second-hand housing transactions during the holiday period were bleak. Analysts believe that the continuous decline in the real estate market for four years is the main cause of the contraction in consumer spending.
The Central Broadcasting Network reported on October 9 that during the 8-day National Day holiday in 2025, there were 8.88 billion domestic trips in China, an increase of 1.23 billion trips compared to the 7-day holiday in 2024, representing a 1.6% year-on-year growth. The average daily spending per person on domestic trips was 113.88 yuan, a 13% decline compared to the previous year.
The total retail sales of social consumer goods in August decreased by 0.3 percentage points compared to July, marking the lowest point so far this year. On September 20, the Ministry of Commerce of the Chinese Communist Party, along with eight other departments, issued a set of measures to expand service consumption and stimulate consumer spending during the National Day holiday.
However, as the National Day holiday came to an end, official data showed that despite many stimulus measures introduced in various regions, the effects were not satisfactory.
Leading financial media outlet “Mars Macro Analysis” conducted a data analysis of the National Day holiday and reached three conclusions.
Firstly, there was a significant downgrade in holiday spending, reflecting an ongoing trend of consumer spending decline. Although there was an increase in the number of travelers, people chose to cut down on expenses. In places like Wuhan, there were reports of tourists unable to afford comfortable hotel stays and opting for “poor travel” by setting up tents on the streets. Young people were seen roaming the streets with camping gear instead of staying in luxury hotels, following tour groups, or caring about comfort and cleanliness. Parks and green spaces in cities like Wuhan were crowded with people camping out, revealing the helplessness of young people engaging in “poor travel”.
While the Chinese economy remains sluggish, the stock market has been defying the trend and showing growth. The A-share market saw its fifth consecutive month of gains in September. By the end of September, the MSCI China Index closed at 9192.18 points, a 28.1% increase compared to the same period last year.
On October 9, the first trading day after the National Day holiday, the three major A-share indexes opened higher, with the Shanghai Composite Index breaking through the 3900-point mark, reaching a new high in nearly a decade.
According to media reports from Caijing News Agency, over the past decade, the number of A-share investors has achieved a “billion-level” leap. At the end of 2015, official data from China Securities Depository and Clearing Corporation showed that there were 99.11 million A-share investors in China, with individual investors accounting for 98.82 million households and institutional investors only 280,000 households, making up over 99% of the market. However, by the end of 2024, the number of A-share investors had reached 237 million households, with individual investors accounting for 236 million households and non-individual investors for only 570,000 households.
As of 2025, the total number of A-share investors has exceeded 240 million households, with an increase of over 140% in the past decade, indicating that one in every six Chinese individuals is now an A-share investor.
“Mars Macro Analysis” pointed out that Chinese officials aimed to cultivate the stock market as a reliable source of household profits, making stimulating consumer spending by boosting stock prices a priority policy for this year. However, despite the extended bullish market trend, it did not encourage households to spend more during the October holiday period, raising concerns amid the already slowing economy.
An article from the Shenzhen Business Daily on September 25 reported that stocks and funds only accounted for 15% of total assets owned by Chinese residents.
“Mars Macro Analysis” suggested that a simple data calculation reveals that the 28.1% increase in stock market values can only result in a 4.2% increase in residents’ wealth.
The second conclusion from “Mars Macro Analysis” is that stimulating the stock market cannot lead to a consumption recovery.
In assessing National Day holiday consumption, not only does it involve travel spending, but also looks at holiday movie box office revenue and the performance of the property market.
Real-time data from online platforms showed that as of 3:44 PM on October 8, the total box office revenue for movies during the 8-day National Day holiday from October 1 to October 8, 2025, exceeded 1.8 billion yuan. This was a decrease of 14.5% and 36.6% compared to the 7-day holidays in 2024 and 6-day holidays in 2023, respectively. The average daily box office was 225 million yuan, representing a reduction of 25% and 52.4% from previous years.
Regarding the property market, there is a lack of unified national data. According to data released by Anjuke in Shanghai on October 8, during the 7-day National Day holiday (from October 1 to October 7), only 780 second-hand housing units were sold in Shanghai, with an average daily transaction of just 111 units, a decrease of over 63% compared to the same period in 2024.
With property prices continuously declining over the past four years, most official reports avoid discussing second-hand housing transactions. “Mars Macro Analysis” believed that the dismal performance in Shanghai is likely similar in other regions. Several unofficial channels reported a 43% year-on-year decrease in second-hand housing transactions in 30 cities during the National Day holiday. This data cannot be confirmed or refuted at the moment.
According to “Mars Macro Analysis,” with the National Day holiday in 2025 being one day longer than the previous year, the actual real estate data may be even weaker than portrayed. This indicates that the traditional stimulus measures like boosting the stock market, promoting big-ticket purchases, trade-in programs, and discount vouchers may not be effective in reviving consumer spending. Therefore, the third conclusion is that only by raising the income of middle and low-income earners can true consumption recovery be achieved.
As property prices have been on a downward trend for nearly four years and the Chinese consumer market continues to shrink, subsidy policies in sectors like automobiles and electronics have not yielded the desired results.
An article by financial expert “Ye Wei Zha Ji” noted that this is closely tied to the trajectory of the real estate market and employment situations. During the previous period of rising property prices, the wealth generated by property appreciation encouraged households to expand their consumption. Conversely, households burdened by heavy mortgage payments had to cut back on daily expenses to cope with their monthly repayments, highlighting the so-called “squeeze-out effect.”
With the real estate market in decline for four consecutive years, wealth dynamics have reversed, and the squeeze-out effect persists, significantly weakening the purchasing power of residents. Moreover, at present, there is no single industry that can fully substitute the position of real estate in the national economy.
Given that real estate dominates the core position in household assets and liabilities, the space available for expenditures on dining, clothing, entertainment, and other areas has been greatly constrained, leading to a broad collapse in consumer spending.