Saudi Arabia Macroeconomic Developments
- According to the General Authority for Statistics (GAStat), Saudi Arabia’s trade balance achieved a surplus for the 38th month in a row during October. The volume of foreign trade recorded an increase of seven percent, reaching SAR178 billion ($47.5 billion), compared to SAR167 billion ($445 billion) YoY. The Kingdom’s overall merchandise exports during the month of October recorded a decrease of 17.4 percent to SAR104.3 billion ($27.8 billion), compared to SAR126.2 billion ($33.7 billion) YoY.
- Saudi Arabia’s total unemployment rate reached 5.1 percent in the third quarter of 2023, according to GAStat. This reflects a decrease of 0.7 percent YoY and an increase of 0.2 percent QoQ.
- Saudi Arabia announced the launch of a unified visa platform called ‘KSA Visa’ to facilitate visa application procedures. GOV.SA platform will aid more than 50 government agencies and private sector players through government visas and will automate vital visa issuance procedures.
