Hey big Spanish Christmas spender!

Christmas shoppers on Málaga city’s landmark Calle Larios in 2015.

According to a new survey just published by Deloitte, Spaniards will be forking out an average of €682 on Christmas this year, which is a whopping 30% more than the EU average, and also puts them in 2^nd place in Europe after the Danes who are forecast to shell out around €689 per head this festive season…

Predicting that, on average, Europeans will each spend some €517 on Christmas 2016 (down 1% on last year), Deloitte notes that consumer confidence is clearly on the ascent in Spain, with 66% of those surveyed believing they have at least the same – or even higher – spending power this year than last, compared with 52% in the period leading up to Christmas 2015.

Given that Spaniards are in the bottom half of the EU league table when it comes to their income-living costs ratio, optimism would appear to be running particularly high in Spain, while other festive spenders preparing to push the boat out somewhat further than the European average include Italy (€614), Belgium (€592); and Germany (€529).

In contrast, those Europeans planning to spend the least this Christmas include the Greek (€439); Portuguese (€431); and Polish (€328).

The lion’s share of Christmas budgets in Spain this year – €265 – will be spent on gifts (an increase of 1% on last year); closely followed by food (€212 which represents a jump of 7%): travel (€132, up by 5%); while the expenditure on other leisure items, such as meals out and going to parties, will amount to €73, a 6% rise on figures for 2015.

Deloitte’s findings are based on interviewing 6,600 people in nine countries.