SAMA report shows Saudi POS hit $3.64bn, construction-led surge, but totals slipped 4.3%

Saudi Arabia’s point-of-sale economy is still moving, and SAMA’s latest weekly read makes that clear. In the week ending June 6, total POS transaction value landed at SR13.67 billion, equivalent to about $3.64 billion, with 238.75 million transactions recorded across the Kingdom.

But here is the real tension for decision-makers: even with that $3.5 billion-plus momentum, the overall total value declined by 4.3% week-over-week, and the number of transactions edged down by 4.9%. Translation: consumers and businesses are still using cards, but the weekly spend pace softened. For anyone tracking Saudi demand, payment behavior is giving you both signals at once: engagement with digital payments remains strong, while the intensity of spend is not.

What powered the positive parts of the story were specific sectors. SAMA data showed the transport sector generated POS spending of SR1.03 billion, a 38.8% increase compared to the previous seven days. In healthcare, POS spending came in at SR860.37 million, up 19.5%. And construction and building material outlays rose sharply, up 71.3% to SR392.57.

That construction spike matters because it is not just “more spending.” It is spending in a specific category that often ties to real-economy activity like projects, materials procurement, and build cycles. When that accelerates inside an otherwise slightly softer weekly total, it suggests that parts of the economy are absorbing pressure differently. Some pockets can strengthen while the overall aggregate still dips.

The value picture also gets interesting when you look at how food, retail, and specialty categories behaved. Food and beverages POS transactions stood at SR2.29 billion. Within that, spending at restaurants and cafes reached SR1.71 billion, while apparel, clothing, and accessories totaled SR1.06 billion. Meanwhile, the gas station category recorded POS transactions at SR980.40 million, and spending in jewelry reached SR550.74 million.

Education was the standout growth anomaly. POS transactions in the education sector totaled SR147.30 million, representing a weekly increase of 800.1%. That is the kind of outsized move that can jump out in dashboards because it suggests either a shift in timing, a campaign-like period, or meaningful changes in how transactions are being captured. Either way, it is big enough to notice in executive reporting, especially if you are benchmarking consumer categories or planning partner campaigns tied to education demand.

Geography tells a second layer of the story. Riyadh dominated POS transactions with expenses in the capital reaching SR4.63 billion, up 4% compared to the previous week. Jeddah followed with POS transactions amounting to SR1.88 billion, a 10.1% increase from the previous seven days. Dammam posted SR674.29 million, followed by Makkah at SR552.19 million and Madinah at SR549.95 million. Al-Khobar recorded SR385.58 million, while Buraidah and Abha came in at SR344.32 million and SR178.67 million, respectively.

So what does this add up to for executives? First, the steady weekly baseline above the $3.5 billion level reinforces that Saudi Arabia’s shift toward digital payments is not a flash-in-the-pan. The SAMA data also aligns with the broader framing of Vision 2030 as a reform initiative supporting economic transformation and diversification. Second, the fact that total transaction value fell 4.3% while selected sectors rose suggests a reallocating consumer and business budget, not a collapse in payment usage.

Third, the discrepancy between “value” and “number of transactions” is a useful signal. With transactions down 4.9% but total value down only 4.3%, the average transaction value likely did not shrink as fast as transaction counts. That kind of pattern can reflect ticket size holding up even when frequency dips, which matters for retailers, merchants, and financial partners tracking merchant economics.

Bottom line: the week ending June 6 delivered a split-screen market. Aggregates softened, but transport, healthcare, construction, and especially education pushed higher. If you are advising boards, underwriting growth, or planning payment-linked partnerships across Saudi cities and sectors, this is the kind of dataset that helps you stop treating “consumer spending” as one uniform weather system. It is not. It is sectors, cities, and categories moving at different tempos, under a regulator-defined lens from SAMA.