Saudi card spending drops SAR 3bn in week ending October 10

Key Points

1. Point-of-sale sales fell to about SAR 13.5 billion from SAR 16.5 billion week-on-week.
2. Transactions dropped to 253.4 million from 273.9 million, central bank weekly bulletin shows.
3. The decline, about 18%, lands in the quarter retailers and restaurants count on most.

The latest:

Saudi point-of-sale sales fell to roughly SAR 13.5 billion in the week ending 10 October 2026, down from about SAR 16.5 billion a week earlier, according to the Saudi Central Bank’s weekly bulletin published by Argaam on Wednesday 14 October 2026. The number of transactions slipped to about 253.4 million from 273.9 million. The four-week moving average stood near SAR 14.1 billion.

Details:

• The gap: The week-on-week difference is about SAR 3 billion, equal to roughly 18% — a figure calculated from the two published totals rather than stated in the bulletin itself. The bulletin reports weekly values without attaching an explanation to the swing.
• Transaction volume: Beyond the value of sales, activity itself thinned: about 253.4 million transactions were recorded against 273.9 million the previous week, a drop of roughly 20 million swipes. That points to fewer purchases overall, not merely smaller baskets at the till.
• The trend line: The four-week moving average of about SAR 14.1 billion sits above the week’s 13.5 billion, placing the reading below the recent running pace. The average is the smoothing measure the central bank publishes alongside the weekly headline figure.
• Food leads: Food and beverages remained the largest spending category at SAR 2.3 billion, or 17% of the weekly total. Restaurants and cafés followed with SAR 1.71 billion, a 12.6% share — the two consumer-facing sectors most exposed to any pullback in day-to-day outings.
• Riyadh’s weight: The capital accounted for about SAR 4.82 billion, or 35.6% of all point-of-sale spending nationwide — more than a third of the country’s card activity concentrated in a single city. Jeddah came second with SAR 1.8 billion, a 13.3% share.
• Payments shift: Citing the central bank’s latest data, Argaam reported that electronic payments reached 85% of retail payments in 2025, up from 57% in 2021. The higher that share climbs, the more closely weekly point-of-sale data tracks total household spending.
• The timing: The reporting week covers 10 October 2026, the day of the Riyadh airport attack. The central bank bulletin does not link the spending decline to the attack or to any other event, and publishes no commentary on the causes behind weekly movements.
• Publication chain: The figures reached the public through Argaam, which cited the Saudi Central Bank’s weekly point-of-sale bulletin. No breakdown of the weekly decline by category or by city was published alongside the headline totals.

Background:

The Saudi Central Bank publishes point-of-sale data weekly, making it one of the fastest available reads on household spending in the kingdom — faster than quarterly retail or GDP releases, and increasingly representative as card and digital payments displace cash.

Between the lines:

With Riyadh carrying 35.6% of national card spending, any disruption concentrated in the capital moves the national number on its own. Food, beverages, restaurants and cafés together account for nearly 30% of weekly sales, and those are discretionary, out-of-home categories that respond within days rather than months. A single weekly reading, however, is volatile by nature and does not establish a trend.

What’s next

The next weekly bulletin will show whether spending returned toward the SAR 16.5 billion level or stayed below the four-week average, and whether the Riyadh share recovered its 35.6% weight.