Retail sales drop 20% MoM in February

Total retail sales dropped to $3.2b from $4.0n in January.

Retail spending dropped to $3.2b in February, down from $4.0b in January following Chinese New Year shopping, Knight Frank reported.

Online retail sales rose by 1.3 percentage points (pp) to 14.6% in February, rising from 13.3% in January.

According to Knight Frank, F&B shops led the retail scene due to low barriers to entry, with both local and international brands infiltrating shopping malls, heritage shophouse locales, and public housing estates.

Whilst 3,047 F&B shops closed in 2024, there were 3,793 F&B openings, the second highest on record from 1990 with the record high being 3,934 openings in 2021, according to the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA).

“Despite the high number of exits and closures, many local and international F&B brands continue to set up shop. The result is a survival of the fittest climate, where those with deepest pockets remain standing the longest, and homogeneous concepts with little differentiation continue to both blossom and wither at the same time,” Ethan Hsu, head of Retail at Knight Frank Singapore said.