As a reminder, short-selling firm Grizzly Research claimed in March to have contacted Accor hotels in over 25 countries to book rooms for minor girls and unrelated adult men in an overtly sexual context without triggering any red flags. According to Grizzly, 80% of the group's hotels responded to the inquiries and accepted the requests.

'Our requests combined minors, an active war zone, an unnamed modeling agency, and a stay of over a month without parents or other legal guardians,' Grizzly's team reported at the time.

Faced with allegations deemed 'shocking' by management, Accor immediately responded by launching a dual verification process: an internal audit coupled with an independent external assessment conducted by the specialized firm Good Corporation. This thorough review covered a representative sample of 255 hotels across 56 countries, utilizing four distinct booking methods and including mystery visits to 88 establishments.

Major methodological biases highlighted

Accor's General Secretariat used the AGM platform to dismantle Grizzly Research's methodology, describing it as deeply flawed.

According to Accor, the short-seller equated the mere sending of automated rate sheets with firm booking confirmations. The hotel group added that its internal audit revealed that on-the-ground teams had, in the majority of cases, voluntarily terminated exchanges as soon as a request appeared suspicious or when protocols required the presentation of identification and proof of parentage - rigorous responses that Grizzly nevertheless counted as 'final acceptations.'

Consequently, out of the 197 hotels initially targeted by the U.S. fund, only 12 showed incomplete or improvable responses, a far cry from the global failure alleged, Accor asserts.

A reinforced zero-tolerance policy

While the audit findings formally rule out any structural flaws within the group, Accor has nonetheless announced a complete overhaul and tightening of its vigilance program (Watch), structured around three pillars.
Mandatory operational training: 100% of the group's employees must complete reinforced modules incorporating practical case studies to better identify and instantaneously report suspicious behavior.
Contractual tightening: Accor will impose stricter and more binding legal standards on its partner owners (managed and franchised hotels), accompanied by clear and immediate sanctions in the event of non-compliance.
International cooperation: The group is intensifying its collaboration with the international NGO ECPAT as well as major industry trade associations (AHLA, WSTA) to pool sectoral best practices.

Following this clarification, Accor shares rose 2.7% in Paris.