Spain | Analysis of national tourist flows in real time

This document presents estimates of the evolution of spending by national tourists in Spain based on daily card movements of BBVA customers outside their usual residence province from 2018 to the present.

Key points

• Key points:
• The high frequency and granularity of card data makes it possible to advance and complement the official figures, which are based on low periodicity surveys (quarterly / monthly), which are known with delay and with little territorial disaggregation.
• Mobility limitations throughout 2020 caused a sharp decrease in Spanish tourist spending in the country, which fell by more than 30% in the year.
• In 2021 tourism spending continued to fall at the beginning of the year. The lifting of the state of alarm as of May 9 pushed the consumption of Spaniards outside their province of residence, reaching 4pp above 2019 at the end of June.
• The return to normalcy in 2021 especially benefited some Mediterranean Autonomous Communities (Andalusia, Murcia and C. Valenciana), as well as Asturias and Cantabria.
• Despite the recovery, spending in the Balearic Islands and Madrid is still below pre-crisis levels. Despite the recovery of domestic tourism, the consumption of foreigners continues to weigh down the growth of total tourism spending, which is 20% below the records of 2019 in June.

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