EN 
By Rachel Battaglia and Abbey Xu
December spending snapshot: Canadian cardholder spending remained resilient with RBC’s core retail sales rising 0.7% on a three-month average—down slightly from November—but still marking the 13th consecutive period of growth.
Spending over this critical holiday shopping period for retailers was driven by purchases of discretionary goods, while discretionary services and household essentials were little changed over the last three months.
Holiday season triggers temporary shifts in spending
Discretionary goods spending accelerated 1.7% on a three-month average in December, marginally slower than the 2% gain recorded in November.
Spending gains were concentrated in clothing and apparel as households continued to prioritize tangible gift purchases through year-end.
Boxing day sales outpaced levels a year earlier, potentially benefitting from the weekday timing—it was on a Friday in 2025 compared to a Thursday in 2024.
Other categories, however, revealed where households are cutting back.
Discretionary services remained relatively flat , increasing just 0.1% on a three-month average while cardholder spending on essentials declined outright due to softer spending at grocery stores and gas stations.
Spending on dining declined, continuing a two-quarter slowdown. Household and construction-related spending also weakened just as signs of recovery had emerged.
Entertainment and arts spending fell 0.7%—marking the first pullback in two years after exceptional gains over the prior two months driven, at least in part, by the Toronto Blue Jays’ World Series run.
Regional divergence: Ontario and B.C. maintain spending lead for now
British Columbia and Ontario maintained their positions among spending leaders through December, continuing to outpace the national average year-to-date basis. Their strength in recent months mirrors the broader trend with gains concentrated in apparel and travel.
Atlantic provinces paint a markedly different picture with spending continuing to slow through Q4 from throughout the year, while Quebec and the Prairies occupied middle ground.
While regional spending hierarchies remained relatively stable through the second half of 2025, the shifting economic backdrop will set the stage for potential reshuffling. Decelerating population growth will have differentiated impacts with Ontario and B.C. at risk of population declines.
The absence of further interest rate relief—a tailwind that has not yet dissipated—may also threaten to erode momentum in Ontario and B.C. as spending among these interest-rate sensitive households normalizes.
About the Authors :
Rachel Battaglia is an economist at RBC, providing analysis and forecasts for consumer spending trends and provincial economies.
Abbey Xu is an economist at RBC. She is a member of the macroeconomic analysis group, focusing on macroeconomic forecasting models and providing timely analysis and updates on economic trends.
By Carrie Freestone
RBC’s consumer spending tracking report uses RBC Data & Analytics’ proprietary database of anonymized card transactions by Canadian clients. The data are an accounting of merchant transactions that are divided into various spending categories covering tens of millions of weekly card transactions worth billions of dollars each week. Transactions, both in person and online, are classified into 11 broad spending groups: Dining, Education, Finances, Groceries, Health, Household, Shopping, Transport, Travel, Utilities, and Other. Within each group, the data are further classified: for example, shopping covers merchants classified as clothing stores, hobby shops, electronics stores, and jewelers, among others. We exclude purely financial transactions such as cash advances and insurance from spending.
We examined changes in the value of all transactions in these areas using a 7 day rolling sample starting January 1st of each year that is indexed to pre-covid levels which are calculated as the average spending for the month of February 2020. To examine the impact of seasonal factors, we also show each’s year spending profile which depicts monthly trends in spending. Online spending volumes are estimated based on the presence of an RBC card at the time of the authorization.
Protecting your privacy and safeguarding your personal information is a cornerstone of our organizational ethics and values and will always be one of our highest priorities. The underlying data for this analysis was aggregated based on transaction date, region and merchant category, and cannot be used to identify any individual client or merchant. For additional information please visit www.rbc.com/privacy.
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