China Tourism Numbers: Massaged?

Period	Chinese	HKK + Mac	All China	MovChi	MovHkk
Dec 13	240,629	122,365	362,994	Up	Up
Jan 14	268,861	73,629	342,490	Up	Down
Feb 14	305,390	91,294	396,684	Up	Up
Mar 14	361,470	98,332	459,082	Up	Up
Apr 14	377,197	146,097	523,294	Up	Up
May 14	333,845	116,585	450,430	Down	Down
Jun 14	315,166	133,550	448,716	Down	Up
Jul 14	343,709	132,831	476,540	Up	Down
Aug 14	312,549	147,903	460,452	Down	Up
Sep 14	341,729	105,865	447,591	Up	Down
Oct 14	347,778	95,217	442,995	Up	Down
Nov 14	332,517	99,443	431,960	Down	Up
Dec 14	346,941	135,024	481,965	Up	Up
Jan 15	321,458	74,302	395760	Down	Down
Feb 15	406,239	97,216	503,455	Up	Up
Mar 15	279,703	114,473	394,176	Down	Up
Apr 15	358,798	145,479	504,277	Up	Up
May 15	372,766	124,758	497,524	Up	Down
Jun 15	308,087	139,920	448,007	Down	Up
Jul 15	352,625	142,515	495,140	Up	Up
Aug 15	367,736	160,829	528,565	Up	Up
Sep 15	345,243	118,255	463,498	Down	Down
Oct 15	386,663	113,549	500,212	Up	Down
Nov 15	357,655	118,026	475,681	Down	Up
Dec 15	327,129	164,275	491,439	Down	Up
Jan  16	366,409	93,448	459,857	Up	Down
Feb 16	405,307	114,431	519,738	Up	Up
Mar 16	363,878	164,894	528,772	Down	Up
Apr 16	375,567	110,716	486,283	Up	Down
May 16	327,254	125,302	452,556	Down	Up
Jun 16	271,478	143,276	414754	Down	Up

Inspired by this article on Thai tourism and challenges to the Tsai Administration in a Thai newspaper, which said...

Taiwan used to be a popular destination for Thai tourists and workers during the boom years of the 1990s and 2000s. Thailand was among the top-three largest Asean points of origin for tourists visiting Taiwan last year, numbering 70,000. But after Japan granted visa-free entry to Thai tourists three years ago, many have headed northbound with a near-record high of 1 million visitors last year.

....I was studying the tourism numbers wondering if the Thai tourism mini-boom would offset the loss of Chinese group tourists, when I went "huh". If you look at the movements of the numbers something interesting occurs in Oct 2015, when Taiwan officials started claiming that there would be big tourism cuts, because of the election...

Ko Mu-chou (柯牧洲), vice chairman of the Taipei Association of Travel Agencies, said Chinese provincial-level travel authorities have been notified that they are required to cut the number of Taiwan-bound tourists by 95 percent during the period between Dec. 16 and Jan. 15.

MAC dismissed such claims as hyperbolic, saying a fall was possible, but 95% was absurd.

The interesting thing about the numbers to me is when you look at the right hand columns. These two columns show the movement in the numbers over the previous month. Note that prior to October of 2015, there were many months in which the numbers moved in tandem: if tourists from China rose, so did tourists from Hong Kong and Macao. Since October of 2015, the only month where the numbers moved in tandem was February, which boasts Chinese New Year. In all other months they've moved in opposite directions.

If might be a coincidence, but it almost looks like someone is quietly managing the numbers to keep them at a target ratio of between 450,000 and 500,000, permitting the Hong Kong numbers to quietly rise even as the Chinese numbers noisily fall. Alas, the sample is too small to show a definite trend, but it is suggestive.

But -- how long can such management be maintained...?
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