LISBON: Portugal was the country that made the most online purchases abroad out of 32 countries studied, followed by Ireland, according to a survey by online payment system PayPal, published earlier this week. The survey of almost 28,000 consumers, 800 of whom were Portuguese, from countries including Russia, Israel, the United States, Mexico and Japan, showed that 70 percent of the Portuguese surveyed bought goods online between September 2015 and October of this year.
“And of the 70 percent who bought online, 87 percent made purchase from outside Portugal,” said PayPal’s Miguel Fernandes, at a meeting in Lisbon on Tuesday. He added that most purchases by Portuguese Internet users were made in the United Kingdom (42 percent), China (41 percent) and Spain (38 percent), followed by the United States (23 percent) and Germany (17 percent). “Of the 32 countries studied, Portugal was the one that made most purchases abroad, followed by Ireland,” noted Fernandes declining to give a value for total purchases as PayPal is a listed company.
At the other end of the ranking, Japan was the country with the fewest international purchases, and the majority (95 percent) of online buyers only bought goods from within the country.
