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1. Middle East travel disruptions continue amid violent conflict
Travel stocks continued their dip as air travel in the region was disrupted by the burgeoning war between Iran against the U.S. and Israel, Reuters reports.
The news outlet added major hub airports in the region, including Dubai, remained closed for the fourth day in a row.
The conflict also has some worried about the potential for a widespread energy crisis, but so far the price of oil has only seen a limited surge, Bloomberg reports.
2. A look at the World Cup ticket market
Reuters recently took a deep dive into the state of FIFA World Cup 26 ticket sales, noting roughly 2 million tickets have seen sold in the first two phases with tickets "oversubscribed over 30 times."
"To put that hunger for tickets in perspective, FIFA said the requests alone were 3.4 times more than the overall number of spectators who attended 964 games in the last 22 editions combined since 1930," the news outlet reports.
One thing drastically different this year is FIFA using a dynamic pricing model, along with having an official reselling platform — which gives the organization a cut of the resale value.
3. Peachtree CEO says transactions could be muted until '29
In a recent interview with CoStar News' Natalie Harms, Peachtree Group Managing Principal and CEO Greg Friedman said it could take another few years for the hotel transactions environment to fully stabilize.
"You know, four years ago, [it was] about 'survive to 2025,' and I feel like now it's about grinding it out till 2029," he said, "because it's going to take several years to really recover from this higher for longer, long-term interest rate environment."
He does believe 2026 will see more deal volume than 2025, and "there'll be the ability to buy a lot more assets opportunistically" this year.
4. Experts see worrying signs in hotel performance
A new Wall Street Journal story takes a closer look at hotel performance data, noting there are some worrying signs for the broader economy if you read the tea leaves.
"The hospitality business paints a picture of an economy more-dependent on wealthy Americans and the AI boom helping to make them richer," the newspaper reports. "That doesn’t mean it can’t keep growing at a healthy rate, but it’s resting on a narrower base."
5. A&O picks up land for Europe's largest hostel
Berlin could soon be home to the largest hostel in Europe after Germany-based A&O Hostels announced the purchase of a 334,000-square-foot vacant office executives plan to convert.
A&O estimates the company will spend more than €40 million in capital expenditures on the project, CoStar News' Terence Baker reports.
The property is projected to have 2,500 bed across 610 rooms, 31% of which will be private.