Chart of the Day: Will visitor arrivals surpass 2016 levels?

Latest visitor arrival growth was at 4.4%.

According to RHB, the drivers of the hospitality demand is in place as visitor arrivals year to date clocked in a 4.4% growth. following the 7.7% uptick last year.

"We expect visitor demand to remain healthy as we see catalysts in the form of the opening of Changi Airport Terminal 4 (T4) in 3Q17F, more meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (MICE) events with 2018 being an even calendar year as well as signs of improvement in corporate sector multinational corporation (MNC) profits in tandem with the economic growth," RHB analyst Vijay Natarajan said.

Last year, total visitor arrivals were over 16 million, higher than the 15 million in 2015. As of April this year, visitor arrivals sits at almost 6 million.

"Overall, we expect visitor arrivals to grow at a healthy 5-7% in 2018, which bodes well for the hospitality sector demand," the analyst said.