The month of October brought with it, as expected during a period of war, and especially at the beginning, a very massive decline in the Israeli public's spending on credit cards, in terms that we have not seen since the coronavirus period. According to Shva data, the hardest hit was mainly in the evacuated cities, in the southern and northern communities, but there was also severe damage in the first weeks of the war.
The data show that credit card spending in Sderot and Kiryat Shmona was cut by about 80%. In other cities in the south and north, such as Ashkelon, Netivot, Be'er Sheva, Ashdod and Nahariya, credit expenditures declined by 30%-40%.
A closed shopping center in Kiryat Shmona during the "Iron Swords" war, photo: Eyal Margolin - Ginny
However, there is also good news regarding business activity in cities in the lowlands and central regions, which have been in some recovery since the easing of restrictions on the home front began. Tel Aviv-Yafo, where credit spending dropped by 40% during the first week of Iron Swords, managed to recover, and over the past two weeks its expenses have been only 20% lower than usual.
"We can see from the data that the economy is in a trend of recovery from the trauma of the first week of the war, and the return to routine, in the shadow of the war, contributes to an increase in business activity," says Tali Holberg, vice president of marketing and business development at Shva. "We see that the city of Rishon LeZion, which as mentioned has become one of the launching centers of the war, is still unable to return to the scope of activity of the adjacent cities in the Shfela and Central regions, and business activity there is still low compared to Ness Ziona. Rehovot and Holon.
Shopping center in Sderot, photo: Liron Moldovan
"The city of Eilat, even though its accommodations are almost full, is also experiencing a decline in business activity and we assume that the reason for this is that the evacuees who arrived there are not on vacation, but are recovering from trauma they have undergone, and therefore their personal consumption is not the same as that of someone who is on vacation in the city."
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