The electronic card transactions (ECT) series cover debit, credit, and charge card transactions with New Zealand-based merchants. The series can be used to indicate changes in consumer spending and economic activity.
Key facts
All figures are seasonally adjusted unless otherwise specified.
Values are at the national level and are not adjusted for price changes.
February 2024 month
Changes in the value of electronic card transactions for the February 2024 month (compared with January 2024) were:
- spending in the retail industries decreased 1.8 percent ($120 million)
- spending in the core retail industries decreased 1.4 percent ($83 million).
| Month | Actual | Seasonally adjusted |
| Feb-21 | 5391444000 | 5866148000 |
| Mar-21 | 5937346000 | 5876709000 |
| Apr-21 | 5989711000 | 6140817000 |
| May-21 | 6129789000 | 6280310000 |
| Jun-21 | 5930914000 | 6329338000 |
| Jul-21 | 6252189000 | 6380762000 |
| Aug-21 | 4821625000 | 5110102000 |
| Sep-21 | 4878099000 | 5120755000 |
| Oct-21 | 5774430000 | 5667114000 |
| Nov-21 | 6436912000 | 6174664000 |
| Dec-21 | 7770984000 | 6258061000 |
| Jan-22 | 6346436000 | 6385207000 |
| Feb-22 | 5449256000 | 5945876000 |
| Mar-22 | 5910254000 | 5823381000 |
| Apr-22 | 6113927000 | 6236470000 |
| May-22 | 6171502000 | 6396592000 |
| Jun-22 | 6042842000 | 6388044000 |
| Jul-22 | 6221006000 | 6408833000 |
| Aug-22 | 6116981000 | 6438838000 |
| Sep-22 | 6270883000 | 6544110000 |
| Oct-22 | 6734272000 | 6642110000 |
| Nov-22 | 6895341000 | 6606181000 |
| Dec-22 | 8146272000 | 6523878000 |
| Jan-23 | 6515834000 | 6632125000 |
| Feb-23 | 6085125000 | 6654349000 |
| Mar-23 | 6824429000 | 6664217000 |
| Apr-23 | 6502381000 | 6699733000 |
| May-23 | 6389119000 | 6585373000 |
| Jun-23 | 6341161000 | 6665335000 |
| Jul-23 | 6395060000 | 6621496000 |
| Aug-23 | 6372791000 | 6677076000 |
| Sep-23 | 6370078000 | 6616361000 |
| Oct-23 | 6596333000 | 6581570000 |
| Nov-23 | 7037830000 | 6684368000 |
| Dec-23 | 8100650000 | 6563120000 |
| Jan-24 | 6617940000 | 6692837000 |
| Feb-24 | 6238404000 | 6572484000 |
By retail spending category, movements were:
- consumables, down $23 million (0.9 percent)
- fuel, down $21 million (3.7 percent)
- durables, down $15 million (0.9 percent)
- apparel, down $5.1 million (1.5 percent)
- motor vehicles (excluding fuel), up $0.7 million (0.3 percent).
| Industry (ANZSIC06) | Percentage change |
| Consumables | -0.9 |
| Durables | -0.9 |
| Apparel | -1.5 |
| Motor vehicles excl. fuel | 0.3 |
| Fuel | -3.7 |
| Non-retail excl. services | -2.4 |
| Services | 1.5 |
Note, the seasonally adjusted series are adjusted independently of each other, therefore, the sum of the component categories may differ from the total.
The non-retail (excluding services) category decreased by $55 million (2.4 percent) from January 2024. This category includes medical and other health care, travel and tour arrangement, postal and courier delivery, and other non-retail industries.
The services category was up $5.1 million (1.5 percent). This category includes repair and maintenance, and personal care, funeral, and other personal services.
The total value of electronic card spending, including the two non-retail categories (services and other non-retail), decreased from January 2024, down $176 million (1.9 percent).
Due to the effect of COVID-19 on tourism, we are unable to release seasonally adjusted figures for the hospitality category. As such, we focused on the actual hospitality values for this release. We will resume the release of seasonally adjusted figures for the hospitality industry in the upcoming electronic card transaction release.
Spending in the hospitality category increased 8.6 percent ($101 million) between February 2023 and February 2024.
In actual terms, cardholders made 160 million transactions across all industries in February 2024, with an average value of $55 per transaction. The total amount spent using electronic cards was $8.8 billion, up 4.9 percent ($409 million) from February 2023. February 2024 had an extra day of trading as it was a leap year.
Seasonal adjustment: quality note
COVID-19 related disruptions have introduced unusual patterns to both the monthly and quarterly electronic card transaction series. While many series have started returning to regular seasonal patterns, we advise caution when making inferences from seasonally adjusted data for the period March 2020 to early 2022.
Updates in next electronic card transactions release
In the next electronic card transactions release, scheduled for 12 April 2024, we will implement enhancements to the seasonal adjustment methodology. The main change is to use automatic additive outlier detection to calculate seasonal adjustment.
See:
- Seasonal adjustment and automatic outliers in time series after COVID-19 for information about the process, which Stats NZ has implemented across various releases.
- Update to seasonal adjustment methodology for the Retail Trade Survey for changes in methodology for retail trade.
We will also resume the publication of seasonal adjusted series for the hospitality industry, and trend series for all categories in the electronic card transactions data.
Seasonally adjusted data is revised with each new month or quarter of data. Due to the effects of COVID-19 on spending, seasonally adjusted series have changed more than usual. When we introduce enhancements to the seasonal adjustment methodology in the release for the March 2024 month and quarter, revisions to the time series between October 2002 and February 2024 may be larger than normal.
More data
Use Infoshare to access the electronic card transactions time series:
Subject category: Economic indicators
Group: Electronic card transactions (ANZSIC06) – ECT
Definitions and metadata
Electronic card transactions data collection methodology – DataInfo+ gives general methodology used to produce electronic card transaction statistics.
Electronic card transactions concepts – DataInfo+ gives definitions of terms used in this release.
Technical enquiries
Yvonne Fakahau
04 931 4600
[email protected]
ISSN 1178-0258
Next release
Electronic card transactions: March 2024 will be released on 12 April 2024.
