How the market is built: the economy, the dollar and credit, against neighbours and other regions

The economy in a few numbers

AMRO's 2026 Annual Consultation Report on Cambodia estimates growth of 5.3 percent in 2025, down from 6.0 percent in 2024, and gives GDP per person of about 2,874 US dollars for 2025. The IMF, concluding its 2025 consultation in November 2025, projected growth of 4.8 percent for 2025, pointing to export volatility, declining remittances, a slowdown in tourism and weak domestic demand, and said that risks were tilted to the downside, with financial sector vulnerabilities at the centre.

The two figures for 2025 differ because they come from different institutions at different dates: the IMF's is a projection made during 2025, AMRO's an estimate made after the year ended. A figure for a market should always be quoted with its source and date. Lesson 2 of the course Southeast Asia in the world explains how to compare income across countries.

An economy that runs on two currencies

Cambodia uses the riel and the US dollar side by side. AMRO staff, in a blog post of September 2026 that gives the authors' views, report that 83.4 percent of broad money was in US dollars at the end of 2025, and note that banks must therefore meet demand for liquidity in both currencies. The IMF describes the exchange rate regime as a managed float that is crawl-like in practice, and in 2025 mentioned that lending in riel is currently targeted at 10 percent, to avoid currency mismatches on corporate balance sheets.

For a borrower who earns riel and owes dollars, the instalment in riel moves with the exchange rate:

Instalment in riel = instalment in US dollars × riel per US dollar

A worked example with illustrative numbers. A shopkeeper earns riel and repays 50 US dollars a month. At 4,000 riel per dollar, the instalment costs 200,000 riel. If the riel weakened to 4,400 per dollar, it would cost 220,000 riel, 10 percent more, with no change in the loan. AMRO reports that the riel in fact appreciated by 1.5 percent in 2025, at around 4,000 per dollar in the first half of the year, so the example is a risk to test, not a forecast.

Credit is large compared with the economy

The IMF reports that the ratio of credit to GDP rose from 24.2 percent in 2010 to 134.5 percent in 2023, after a peak close to 140 percent in late 2022. AMRO puts the ratio at around 127.8 percent in 2025. On the World Bank's measure of domestic credit to the private sector, from the World Development Indicators, the figures for 2024 were:

• Cambodia: about 125 percent;
• Thailand about 146, Malaysia about 116, the Philippines about 50 and Indonesia about 36 percent;
• the world about 140 percent;
• Latin America and the Caribbean about 52, South Asia about 42 and Sub-Saharan Africa about 32 percent, the last for 2023.

So Cambodia's ratio is somewhat below the world figure and Thailand's, above Malaysia's and far above the figures for Latin America, South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. The world figure is pulled up by the largest economies. The IMF, AMRO and World Bank figures differ because they are for different years and may differ in source and coverage; compare like with like, from one series.

Few accounts, much credit

The World Bank's Global Findex Database 2025, from surveys in 2024, found that about 39 percent of adults in Cambodia had an account at a financial institution or with a mobile money provider. The figures were about 38 percent in Laos, 71 in Vietnam and 92 in Thailand. For developing economies by World Bank region, they were about 83 percent in East Asia and Pacific, the region that includes Cambodia, 58 in Sub-Saharan Africa and 53 in the Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan and Pakistan, so Cambodia stood below all of them.

Read the two measures together. Credit of more than the whole economy's annual output, alongside an account for only about two adults in five, suggests that credit is concentrated on fewer people or goes mostly to firms; the two figures alone do not say which. Lesson 5 looks at households and microfinance borrowing.

Loan quality through the cycle

The IMF reported in its 2024 consultation that ratios of non-performing loans rose from 2.9 percent in 2022 to above 6.5 percent in the second quarter of 2024, particularly fast in sectors that included construction and real estate. AMRO reports a ratio of 8.3 percent for deposit-taking institutions at the end of December 2025, with credit growth of 5.4 percent at the end of 2025, slowing to 3.8 percent in March 2026. In 2025 the IMF called for forbearance, special relief measures such as deferred repayment, to be phased out by the end of 2025, so that distressed assets are recognised in time, and for a deposit insurance scheme to be established.

These ratios come from different reports and may cover different groups of institutions. Before comparing years or markets, check which lenders a ratio covers; lesson 4 explains how to read these statistics.

Reading the market as a lender

• Quote every figure with its source and date; estimates from different institutions differ.
• Test what a weaker riel would do to borrowers who earn riel and owe dollars, and to the lender's own funding.
• Read credit depth with account ownership: much credit and few accounts call for a closer look at who holds the debt.
• Check which institutions a loan quality ratio covers before comparing years or markets.
• Follow the current figures on the Cambodia research page and the rules in force on the Cambodia lending rules page.