Saudi Arabia may no longer be the exporter of capital into global financial markets that it once was, but in at least one area the amount of money leaving the country has soared: As the kingdom’s foreign workforce has swelled, outbound remittances have risen to the highest levels on record, government figures show, leading to a surge in cash leaving the Saudi economy as expats send earnings home.
Remittances by expatriates amounted to nearly $14 billion in the second quarter of the year, the most recent data available shows — an increase of about 50% since 2017. That’s also a reflection of the country’s surging numbers of foreign workers: Since 2017, around 1 million jobs have been created for Saudis, compared to 1.4 million jobs for expatriates.
The kingdom has been working to stop what it calls “leakage” of money outside the country by both citizens and expatriates by loosening social restrictions and improving quality of life via culture and entertainment. But it is yet to go as far as neighboring UAE, which has already made property investment widely available to expatriates and also established retirement saving products to encourage foreign workers to keep their cash inside the country for the long term.