The World Cup was expected to bring a huge tourism boom to the United States, but now there are fears that this may never materialize.
A report released by the American Hotel & Lodging Association (AHLA) has found that hotel bookings are well below expectations in almost every World Cup host city.
AHLA stated that this does not match FIFA's claim that more than five million tickets have been sold and warned that "expected economic growth may fall short of expectations."
AHLA is the largest hotel association in the US, representing more than 32 properties and over 80 percent of all franchised hotels in the country.
The report attributes part of the blame to FIFA, which is accused of pre-booking far more hotel rooms than it needed for internal use, creating artificial demand.
According to AHLA, this situation led to artificial price increases, while after FIFA canceled a large number of reservations, the market was left with a lack of demand and many vacant seats.
On the other hand, FIFA stated that it does not recognize this accusation.
Hotels pointed out that high ticket prices for matches, local transport costs, taxes and the political climate have negatively affected fans and potential tourists.
For the hotel industry, this World Cup risks being a huge disappointment.
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