Vietnamese top international tourists in card spending in RoK
With nearly KRW200,000 in each per-capita card transaction, Vietnamese tourists spent the most among international visitors to the Republic of Korea (RoK) in 2022, according to the RoK’s credit card and financial service company BC Card.
Data released by BC Card on May 3 showed that Vietnamese tourists’ per-capita authorised card transactions stood at KRW197,000 (US$147.21) each in 2022, 89% more than what they spent in the previous year.
This was higher than KRW188,000 in card purchases by the second-biggest spender Japanese tourists, KRW171,000 by Chinese visitors, KRW126,000 by those from Taiwan (China), and KRW109,000 by Americans.
For the last three years, Vietnamese spent the most when shopping at duty-free outlets and department stores, as well as on hospital visits and cosmetics in the RoK. In particular, their spending at duty-free stores and department stores last year exploded by 1,837% and 400% year on year, respectively.
This result matched the purposes of Vietnamese tourists when coming to the RoK as surveyed by the Korea Tourism Organisation, namely shopping, food, beauty care, and health care.