Who will save Asia's hotels with Covid-19 on the rampage?

In Malaysia, some big chain hotels have been slashing their room rates and coming up with two-for-one buys since the start of the conditional movement control order. — ART CHEN/The Star

With Covid-19 on the rampage and ever more sly as travellers await an elusive silver bullet vaccine, Asia is on sale. In a trend that began early 2020, over-leveraged independents and smaller hotel groups are racing to offload debt as hungry property funds with groaning war chests sniff around for rock-bottom deals.

The wholesale offloading of property in a hugely depressed market has sent prices crashing as no one has a magic post-Covid looking glass – or a suitable algorithm – to predict travel habits once the current plague is passed.