Business, government spend grows US$2.1 trillion in Asia

Asia - Government and business spend rose 13% to reach some US$18.9 trillion in Asia last year, according to a new study.

The five largest Asia-Pacific economies in size of total business and government spending were Japan at US$5.2 trillion, China at US$4.9 trillion, India at US$2.3 trillion, South Korea at US$2 trillion and Australia at US$1.2 trillion, according to the Visa Commercial Consumption Expenditure (CCE) index.

The CCE index is a financial metric which provide the homogeneous tracking of business and government spending worldwide. It is widely regarded as an industry benchmark for measuring commercial spending.

Myanmar, Hong Kong, Singapore, India and the Philippines were calculated as the fastest growing Asia-Pacific economies in size of total business and government spend.

John Hazlewood, director of Visa Commercial Solutions in Asia Pacific said, "The markets across Asia Pacific are varied in terms of their stages of development and usage of commercial card products. Using the findings from the CCE index developed by Visa, we can better measure the penetration of commercial payment products and assist our client financial institutions in developing solutions tailored to meet the evolving payments needs of business and government."

This year, 21 economies from countries and territories in the Asia-Pacific region were measured as part of the CCE index with 16 of those outpacing the average annual growth increase.