COVID-19 impact on Financial transactions and Consumer behaviour in Bahrain: Derasat-UNDP Bahrain Report

COVID-19 impact on Financial transactions and Consumer behaviour in Bahrain: Derasat-UNDP Bahrain Report

As part of its partnership with UNDP Bahrain to study the socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Kingdom of Bahrain, the Bahrain Center for Strategic, International and Energy Studies (Derasat) published a report examining data on the number and value of financial transactions in the Kingdom of Bahrain, for the period from January 2019 to June 2020, aiming to analyze the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on various aspects of consumer behavior. This includes the pandemic's effect on overall purchases, purchases per sector, consumer prices, and changes to various payment methods. The report indicated a partial recovery by June 2020, after a considerable fall in point-of-sales transactions, attributed to self- and legally-imposed social distancing measures, which led to restructuring household consumption patterns, promoting household-based consumption (e.g.