Monthly Economic and Financial Developments (MEFD) February 2026

Published: Monday March 30th, 2026

Domestic Economic Developments

Overview

Economic indicators suggest that during the month of February, the domestic economy’s pace of expansion was sustained, relative to the comparative period in 2025, with key economic indicators moving closer to their long-term potential. Tourism activity continued to expand, reflecting further robust expansion in cruise sector earnings, and strengthened stopover receipts, despite persistent capacity constraints. On the fiscal front, preliminary data on the Government’s budgetary operations for the second quarter of FY2025/26 showed that the deficit widened relative to the same quarter in FY2024/25, as the reduction in total revenue exceeded the decline in aggregate expenditure. Further, monetary trends for February were marked by a reduction in the narrow measure of banking sector liquidity, despite an expansion in the deposit base and a contraction in domestic credit. However, external reserves increased, underpinned by net foreign currency inflows through the private sector.

Real Sector

Tourism

Initial data suggests that the tourism sector registered healthy growth, although the high-value added stopover segment continued to experience capacity constraints.

While Ministry of Tourism data was not yet available for February, according to the most recent data provided by the Nassau Airport Development Company Limited (NAD), stopover indicators improved. Total departures—net of domestic passengers—grew by 4.9% to 133,336 in February, relative to the same period of 2025. In particular, non-US international departures expanded by 54.0% to 30,721 vis-à-vis the same period of 2025, countering U.S departures decline of 4.3% to 102,615.

On a year-to-date basis, total outbound traffic increased by 3.4% to 0.3 million. Specifically, non-U.S. international departures rose by 43.7% to 59,124 passengers, while U.S departures fell by 4.0% to 0.2 million passengers.

Likewise, in the short-term rental market, a subset of stopover activity, data from AirDNA revealed that total room nights sold increased by 10.1% to 61,037 in February, relative to the comparative 2025 period. Underlying this outturn, occupancy rates for entire place and hotel comparable listings firmed to 63.0% and 61.4% respectively, from 60.3% and 56.1% in the previous year. Further, the average daily room rate (ADR) for entire place listings moved higher by 9.9% to $658.96, relative to the same period last year. Likewise, the average daily room rate for hotel comparable listings grew by 6.5% to $177.13 vis-à-vis the comparative period in the year prior.

On a year-to-date basis, total room nights sold strengthened by 11.0%, reflective of gains in both entire place listings (11.0%) and in hotel comparable bookings (11.0%). Further, the average daily room rate (ADR) for entire place listings grew by 8.7% and for hotel comparable listings, by 5.7%.

Fiscal

Provisional data on the Government’s budgetary operations for the second quarter of FY2025/26 indicated that the deficit widened to $201.3 million from $190.2 million in the same period of FY2024/25. Underpinning this development, total revenue declined by $40.5 million (5.3%) to $718.0 million, overshadowing the $29.3 million (3.1%) falloff in aggregate expenditure to $919.3 million.

The reduction in revenue was led by a $47.2 million (7.0%) decrease in tax receipts. In particular, collections from taxes on international trade and transactions reduced by $33.9 million (15.1%) to $191.2 million, vis-à-vis the previous year, on account of a $17.3 million (18.5%) falloff in departure taxes, and a $15.6 million (23.9%) reduction in export & excise duties. Similarly, taxes on goods and services fell by $10.8 million (2.6%) to $396.1 million, reflecting a $1.9 million (0.6%) decrease in VAT receipts to $321.8 million, combined with a $0.7 million (2.4%) retrenchment in stamp taxes on financial and realty transactions to $27.1 million. Specific taxes—mainly gaming—moved lower by $6.3 million (35.4%) to $11.4 million, and excise taxes, by $0.7 million (23.3%) to $2.3 million. Taxes on the use of goods and services declined by $1.3 million (3.6%) to $33.5 million, largely explained by a retrenchment in receipts from business license fees (22.7%). Further, property taxes fell by $4.0 million (9.3%) to $39.3 million.

Non-tax revenue increased by $5.9 million (7.1%) to $88.9 million, supported by a $5.4 million (8.5%) gain in proceeds from the sale of goods and services, to $69.5 million, owing mainly to a $5.5 million (36.4%) rise in customs fees receipts. Further, revenue from fines, penalties and forfeitures more than doubled to $3.9 million vis-à-vis the prior year, while proceeds from reimbursements and repayments and the sale of other non-financial assets and miscellaneous and unidentified revenue remained at negligible levels. Conversely, collections from property income decreased by $1.3 million (8.0%) to $15.4 million, relative to the preceding year.

In terms of expenditure, recurrent spending fell by $22.4 million (2.6%) to $854.5 million. Contributing, payments for the use of goods and services reduced by $33.9 million (18.0%) to $154.3 million. In addition, other “miscellaneous” payments declined by $8.2 million (11.5%) to $63.5 million. Similarly, subsidies decreased by $3.6 million (3.2%) to $110.0 million, largely due to a falloff in outlays to public corporations. Similarly, grants decreased by $3.5 million (89.2%) to $0.4 million compared to the preceding year. In contrast, public debt interest payments grew by $11.1 million (5.0%) to $234.2 million and disbursements for personal emoluments, by $12.1 million (5.5%) to $231.4 million. Moreover, social benefits rose by $3.5 million (6.2%) to $60.8 million, relative to the same period a year earlier.

Meanwhile, capital expenditure decreased by $6.9 million (9.7%) to $64.8 million, underpinned by a $14.3 million (21.9%) reduction in the acquisition of non-financial assets to $50.9 million, which outpaced the $7.3 million growth in capital transfers to $13.9 million.

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