Taylor Swift fans drove more than 23,000 transactions over the three-day concert ticket sales period in July for her six shows in Singapore, according to data collated by United Overseas Bank U11 (UOB) on Singapore cardholders’ spending patterns for the year.
This contributed to the $46 million in total spent on concert tickets in 2023 for UOB cardholders, of which $39 million is attributed to concert ticket sales for Western pop acts. Other musical acts include Mandopop and K-pop.
Released on Dec 29, UOB’s year-end wrap up on consumer spending details Singaporeans’ expenditures from December 2022 to November this year. It reveals four dominant areas where Singaporeans exercised the greatest spending power — coffee, fast food, airlines and concerts.
UOB’s data shows Singaporean cardholders spent over $47 million on heartland “kopi” and more premium brews, with close to 4.5 million transactions in total. October showed up as the biggest month for coffee spending.
Meanwhile, UOB cardholders spent over $1 billion on air tickets around the world, with Singapore Airlines C6L being the carrier of choice for both transaction counts and amount spent, followed by budget subsidiary Scoot.
Finally, McDonald’s was Singapore UOB cardholders’ top fast food choice, followed by KFC and Burger King. Burgers accounted for 83.5% of total fast food transactions.
Noting that 2023 has been a “truly remarkable year” for consumer spend as retail purchases have seemingly returned in full force post-pandemic, Jacquelyn Tan, head of group personal financial services at UOB says consumers are gravitating towards spending on experiences rather than on material goods.
“Cases in point include artisan coffee expenditure almost double of its more heartland counterpart, air ticket spending crossing a billion Singapore dollars and concertgoers’ overwhelming response to global entertainment acts coming to our shores next year,” Tan adds.
