Accor guides to a flat fourth quarter on France unrest and Middle East war

Accor is guiding to a flat fourth quarter globally as riots in France and wars in the Middle East cloud the final stretch of the year. The Paris-based group revealed the outlook on Thursday's earnings call, where group chief financial officer Martine Gerow laid out the caution.

Gerow said Accor built "some prudence in France given the events" into its full-year view, referring to the riots, and took "a tougher view" on the Middle East amid the U.S.-Iran war and the Saudi-Houthi war. Both regions are central to the group's revenue.

Accor now expects global RevPAR growth for the full year to land at the top of its 2% to 2.5% range, following a third-quarter gain of 4.9%. That implies roughly flat RevPAR in the fourth quarter, which Morgan Stanley analyst Jamie Rollo called "overly conservative" on the call itself.

Gerow pointed to a tough base effect: global RevPAR grew 7% in the fourth quarter of 2025. France is Accor's largest market at 23% of global room revenue, with the Paris region alone accounting for about 12% of the total.

What the two troubled regions contribute

The Middle East accounts for about 11% of room revenue, split between the United Arab Emirates at roughly 4% and Saudi Arabia at about 5%. A steeper decline there, which Gerow flagged as a risk, feeds directly into the cautious fourth-quarter guide.

In France, Gerow said Accor has seen "a bit of a pick-up in the cancellations", though nothing concerning in forward bookings. The unrest has reached well beyond hotels: we covered the looting that hit Louis Vuitton, Céline and Decathlon as unrest spread across France.

Retailers have also warned that France's looting damage could reach hundreds of millions of euros. That matters to Accor because Paris is so heavy in its mix, and a group whose largest market has just seen unrest must fold that risk into what it tells shareholders.

What the third quarter brought in

Revenue for the third quarter climbed 7.7% to €1.5 billion, roughly $1.69 billion, as average nightly rates rose 4.7% and occupancy held stable. Pricing, not fuller hotels, carried the quarter for a group that says it is powered by more than 290,000 people.

Accor also trimmed its net unit growth target to 3% to 3.5%, a step down with a specific cause: more economy and midscale hotels than planned left its China portfolio. China's exits, France's cancellations and the Middle East conflict now pull in different directions at once.

The growth story has other moving parts. Sebastien Bazin, Accor's chairman, has said the group has not decided whether to list its Ennismore lifestyle arm, valued at up to $5.8 billion, or fund its US expansion itself, a push he has called overdue.

Alongside that is a deal we reported at Dubai Pearl, a site dormant for two decades that is now the subject of a masterplan twice its original size. The Middle East war adds uncertainty to exactly the geography where that deal would land.

Accor's India ambitions have shifted too. Its plan to reach 300 Indian hotels by 2030 relied on a Treebo partnership that fell apart, and we covered the acquisitions the group is now weighing to make up the lost ground in that market.

In our reference guide to the world's most luxurious hotel brands, Accor is among names owned by large groups such as Marriott, Hilton and Hyatt, while independent houses like Aman, Cheval Blanc and Soneva hold the ultra-luxury end of the field.

The flat fourth-quarter guide is not shared across the whole of the sector. We reported LuxExperience swinging to a profit for its fourth quarter and full fiscal year, a sign that results vary by operator and by region.

For Accor's own portfolio, the exposure is concentrated. France at 23%, the Middle East at 11% and China's quiet unit exits together cover the three areas where the group is most open to events outside a hotelier's control.

Rollo was not alone in reading the guide as cautious, since some analysts saw it that way. Gerow's framing left room for both demand weakness and prudence, and the fourth-quarter figures will show which reading was right.

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Image: Photo Credit: In Mont Ventoux in Provence, southern France, Château de Mazan is a hotel that belongs to Accor's network