Report
Q1 2026 Industry Insights
Strong Spending Lifts Credit Card and Personal Loan Balances in Hong Kong’s Consumer Credit Market
Q1 2026 Report highlights include:
- New credit card supply remained constrained, although credit quality remained strong with delinquency rates broadly unchanged
- Revolving lines and loan-on-card continued to decline as fewer consumers held balances and originations slowed
- Credit performance remained resilient, with delinquency rates stable-to-improved across products
Hong Kong’s consumer credit market showed mixed trends in the first quarter of 2026 as credit cards and personal loans remained broadly stable, supported by healthy outstanding balance growth and steady repayment performance. However, revolving lines and loans on card continued to contract, reflecting more selective lender activity and softer demand in those segments.
Credit delinquency trends remained largely stable or improved, suggesting prudent repayment behaviour among consumers, while lenders’ disciplined underwriting and portfolio management continued to support credit quality. This is in the context of a steady inflation rate, at 1.7% for February and March1, and a 5.9% GDP growth2 in the quarter – the strongest in nearly five years.
Summary of growth in unsecured lending products Q1 2026
*Originations are reported one quarter in arrears due to data lag and reflect Q4 2025 volumes. The YoY change in originations reflects movement between Q4 2024 and Q4 2025.
Source: TransUnion Credit Information Services consumer credit database
“For lenders, the priority in 2026 will be to capture growth in stronger segments while maintaining discipline in underwriting and portfolio management. The mix of improving domestic consumption and changing borrower behaviour is likely to reshape credit demand across both secured and unsecured products. In this environment, staying close to emerging opportunities and risks, while acting swiftly on data-driven insights and analytics, will be critical to navigating an increasingly nuanced landscape.”
Weihan Sun, Senior Director of Research and Consulting for Asia Pacific at TransUnion
About the Hong Kong Industry Insights Report
TransUnion’s quarterly Hong Kong Industry Insights Report provides in-depth, statistical information drawn from its regional consumer credit database, aggregated across virtually every active credit file on record. Each file contains hundreds of credit variables that illustrate consumer credit usage and performance. Entities across industries can subscribe to and leverage the Industry Insights Report to analyse market dynamics throughout an entire business cycle, helping them understand consumer behaviour over time. The report looks at major consumer lending categories: credit cards, loan on cards, personal loans, revolving lines, mortgages, and auto loans, focusing primarily on three dimensions across these categories: originations (new accounts opened), balances (outstanding total and average lending balances) and delinquencies (accounts in payment arears).
1 Government of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Consumer Price Indices for February and March 2026
2 News.gov.hk: Economy grows 5.9% in Q1
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