Majed Al-Khalidi from Riyadh
The volume of consumer's spending in Saudi Arabia during the month of October was about 81.35 billion riyals, recording a growth of 4.84%, which is equivalent to 3.76 billion riyals, compared to 77.59 billion riyals in October 2017.
Spending in October rose by 5.7 percent, compared to SR 76.9 billion in September of this year.
According to an analysis of the report's unit in the newspaper "AlEqtisadiah" and based on SAMA data, consumer's spending in Saudi Arabia has improved markedly since the beginning of this year, compared to 2017.
The average expenditure from the beginning of 2018 to the end of October were amounted to SR 81.49 billion, compared with an average expenditure of SR 76.9 billion last year, an increase of 5.93%.
The average spending last year was below the average in 2016 of about 78 billion riyals due to a drop in spending during the third quarter of 2017, which recorded the lowest spending rate in the past two years.
The improvement in consumer's spending comes in October this year through the growth of cash withdrawals via ATMs as well as banks by about 1.5% year on year, with an increase of 909 million riyals in addition to POS operations, which grew by about 2.85 billion riyals and by 17.3% compared to the same period last year.
Consumer's spending on food and beverages grew by 25.3 per cent in October, year on year, to 2.69 billion riyals.
Food and beverage expenditure were accounted for 13.9 per cent of total POS transactions during the period.
Expenditure on restaurants and hotels rose by 38 per cent, accounting for 12.2 per cent of total point-of-sale operations to reach 2.35 billion riyals, an increase of 651 million riyals.
While the growth in entertainment was amounted to about 5.9%, where points of sales in the sector were about to 786 million riyals in October.
Spending on the telecommunications sector by points of sale operations were amounted to about 161.7 million riyals.
Point-of-sale sales during the year 2017 grew by 9.7 per cent to about SR200.46 billion, the highest point of sales since inception.
While the number of operations implemented were about 708.11 million operations during the year, compared to about 524.56 million operations during 2016.
