Saudi Arabia - Investment

For Saudia Arabia, quarterly national accounts and annual national accounts, including the expenditure and production approaches including gross value added by industry, i.e., GDP(E), GDP(O) and GVA.

Active:

• National accounts framework: UN SNA 2008
• Comprehensive revision year: 2023
• Industry classification: UN ISIC Rev. 4
• Measurements:
  • Millions of Saudi riyal (Mil. SAR)
  • At chained year-2023 prices (Mil. Ch. 2023 SAR)
• Adjustments:
  • Seasonally adjusted (SA)
  • Not seasonally adjusted (NSA)
• Native frequencies and start dated:
  • Quarterly, uniformly 2010Q1
  • Annual, as early as 2017

Predecessors, quarterly:

• At 2018 prices, method 2022 - 2010Q1 to 2024Q4 ("_18")
• At 2010 prices, method 2022 - 2010Q1 to 2023Q3 ("_10")
• At 2010 prices, method pre-2022, quarterly - 2010Q1 to 2022Q3 ("_22")
• GVA by institutional sector, quarterly - 2010Q1 to 2021Q1 ("_21")

Predecessors, annual:

• GDP(I) - 2017 to 2022 ("_18")
• GDP(I) - 2013 to 2020 ("_20")
• GDP(I) - 2009 to 2013 ("_13")
• Method pre-2021, annual - 1970 to 2021 ("_22")
• GVA by institutional sector, annual - 1970 to 2020 ("_21")

Global concept aliases:

• GDP, GDP$
• C, C$
• G, G$
• I, I$
• IF, IF$
• CIVT, CIVT$
• NETEX, NETEX$
• EX, EX$
• IM, IM$

GDP is the value of all the goods and services produced in a country in a given time period. The expenditure approach involves counting expenditures on goods and services by different groups in the economy.

The four main components are consumption expenditures by households (C), gross private investment spending principally by firms (I), government purchases of goods and services (G), and net exports (exports minus imports EX – IM).

Changes to methodology or presentation

Concurrent with results for 2021Q3, the alternative presentation of GVA was changed from "institutional sectors" to "main economic activities." Component "private sector" was terminated, and the remaining three (oil, non-oil, government) became re-aggregations of branches in the detailed presentation.

Concurrent with quarterly results for 2022Q4, the component "imputed bank services charge" was terminated.

The annual presentation was terminated after 2021.

Comprehensive revisions were conducted in:

• Revision year 1970, disseminated 1968 through 1973, prepared in accordance with UN SNA 1968.
• Revision year 1999, utilizing the General Population and Housing Census (1992) and the Economic Census (1993), prepared using UN SNA 1993 and UN ISIC Rev. 3.
• Revision year 2010, using ISIC Rev. 4.
• Revision year 2023, disseminated in 2025, utilizing Saudi Census 2022, prepared using UN SNA 2008.

Moody's Analytics supplements

We construct additive identities for total consumption, gross capital formation, and trade balance.

For the 2010-price vintage, we construct counterparts to quarterly GDP(E) and GDP(O) in SAAR terms, using X-13.

For the 2018-price vintage, for GDP(E) and GVA nominal data we construct counterparts in SA (not annualized) terms. Conversely, GDP(E) and GVA at chained prices SA data are reported by the source, and we republish verbatim. 

For GDP(I) reported from 2018, we back-extend by one year using the "_18" vintage. For the employment compensation component, we back-extend to 2002.

For household income (HDI), we back-extend to 2002 by using predecessors and UN data.

Per the source:

The revision policy for the full QNA sets forth a repeated yearly cycle to outline the reference period(s) open to revisions with each new releaseand identifies the first value produced by the full QNA program as a first estimate. Sub-annual QNA results are presented in both unadjusted and seasonally adjusted forms and as such, each has a distinct revision cycle.

Unadjusted Data:

• A first quarter release includes routine revisions to all quarters in the previous year.
• A second quarter release includes routine revisionsto the previous quarter.
• A third quarter release includes revisions to the first two quarters of the same year and all quarters in the previous two years(Annual Benchmarkand SUT revisions)
• A fourth quarter release includes routine revisions to the previous quarter.

Seasonally Adjusted Data:

• A first quarter release includes revisions to all quarters in the previous two years.
• A second quarter release includesrevisions to the previous quarter of the same year and all quartersin the previous year.
• A third quarter release includes revisions to the first two quarters of the same year as well as revisions to all quarters in the previous threeyears.
• A fourth quarter release includes revisions to all quarters of the same year and all quarters in the previous year

In these two series there is a break in method at 2018Q1:

• NACSTLSUQ.ISAU = Import duties, (Mil. 2010 SAR, NSA)
• NALSTLSUQ.ISAU = Import duties, (Mil. SAR, NSA)

Further reading

At the source:

• Gross domestic product
• Statistical methodology: Comprehensive revision of gross domestic product (GDP) (Apr 2025, pdf)
• Chain-linked methodology (Mar 2024)
• GASTAT adopts chain-linked methodology in calculating real GDP of the Kingdom (Mar 2024)
• Quarterly national accounts indicators methodology (Mar 2021)
• Annual national account indicators methodology (Mar 2021)
• National accounts bulletin methodology (Nov 2019)
• National accounts methodology according to SNA2008 (Nov 2019)

At IMF (SDDS):

• National accounts (Jan 2024 / Jan 2025)

• 7 Apr 2023, Phillip Thorne - "Bank service charge" and annual presentation terminated: Properties, Further reading.
• 17 Apr 2024, Phillip Thorne - Re-referenced to 2018: Properties, Further reading.
• 14 Jul 2025, Phillip Thorne - Comprehensive revision 2023, currency reference year advanced to 2023: Properties, Moody's Analytics supplements, Further reading.