Deepavali & Duit: 7 Money Lessons Inspired by the Festival of Lights

Deepavali marks the triumph of light over darkness and knowledge over ignorance. Applied to personal finance, the same idea holds: greater visibility over your income, spending and commitments can help you make more informed financial decisions.

The festive season is a useful financial checkpoint because it brings several spending decisions into a relatively short period. Below are seven money lessons inspired by familiar Deepavali traditions, with practical steps you can apply before 8 November 2026.

Deepavali traditions vary across families and communities. The examples below draw on several familiar practices in Malaysia as inspiration for practical money lessons.

For families that light diyas during Deepavali, the lamps symbolise light overcoming darkness. The financial equivalent is a spending review, a useful first step towards understanding where your money goes.

Most of us know our monthly income. Far fewer can state, with accuracy, what we spend it on.

Before any festive spending begins, set aside 15 minutes for a “diya audit”: 

• Open your banking app and go through the last 30 days of transactions.

• Identify your three largest non-essential expenses.

• List every recurring subscription and auto-debit, including inactive ones. 

That is it: Light in, darkness out. 🌞 Small recurring charges are easy to underestimate. A handful of RM15 subscriptions can quietly add up to a meaningful amount over time.

For some families, the traditional pre-dawn oil bath represents cleansing and a fresh start. In financial terms, this is debt hygiene: resolving the small, recurring commitments that accumulate unnoticed. 

This is increasingly relevant in Malaysia. Buy Now, Pay Later transaction values reached RM7.1 billion in the second half of 2024.¹ As at December 2024, Malaysia had 5.1 million active BNPL users, with the majority aged between 21 and 45 and earning below RM5,000 per month.¹

The concern is not necessarily BNPL itself, but taking on multiple commitments without monitoring the total repayments. Three instalment plans across different platforms may appear manageable individually but can become significant collectively, particularly when their repayment dates coincide with festive spending in the same pay cycle. 

Before the season begins: 

• Consolidate every BNPL and instalment commitment into a single list with due dates and outstanding amounts. 

• Consider whether you can settle an outstanding commitment early without affecting essential expenses, emergency savings or other repayment obligations. 
• Avoid taking on new instalment commitments during the festive month unless you have reviewed the total cost and confirmed that the repayments fit comfortably within your budget.  

A kolam begins with a grid of dots. The pattern is planned before the first line is drawn. Budgeting follows the same logic: allocation precedes expenditure. 

Set a festive budget across five categories and assign a ringgit figure to each: 

• Clothing and grooming 

• Food, sweets and open house 

• Gifts and duit Deepavali 

• Travel (fuel, tolls or tickets) 

• Decorations and home preparation 

Total the five figures and compare the result against what you can fund from savings rather than credit. For context, Malaysia’s mean monthly household consumption expenditure was RM5,566 in 2024.² Your festive budget should therefore be assessed against your own household income, regular commitments and available savings, rather than against the national average.  

For some families, purchasing or wearing gold forms part of festive and cultural traditions around Deepavali. It is auspicious, it is beautiful, and it may retain value over time. However, gold prices can rise or fall, so it is worth understanding how it behaves as an asset before purchasing.

• Jewellery includes a workmanship charge above the underlying gold value. This charge may not be fully recoverable upon resale, which means the buy-back price may be lower than the original purchase price.

• Gold prices are influenced by global market conditions and currency movements. They can fall as well as rise. 

• Gold is often used as a longer-term store of value, but returns are not guaranteed and short-term performance can be unpredictable.

The practical distinction is between purchasing gold for personal use and purchasing it as part of a longer-term financial strategy. If it is the latter, review the gold-related savings or investment options offered by licensed financial institutions. Before committing, understand the applicable fees, the difference between buying and selling prices, the risk of price fluctuations and how the investment can be converted back into cash.

For families that host an open house, food and hospitality can account for a significant portion of festive spending.

Plan your open house around a realistic budget: 

• Set a realistic guest list and cater for that number, with a reasonable buffer for additional guests.
• Consider a potluck arrangement or discuss sharing some hosting costs with family members.
• Decide which dishes are practical to prepare at home and which are more cost-effective to purchase.

• Purchase suitable non-perishables earlier to spread out the cost and reduce last-minute shopping. 

Meaningful hospitality does not depend on how much you spend. A realistic plan can help you focus on spending time with your guests.

Some families celebrate by giving money to children in colourful packets. It can become stressful when it turns into a silent competition.

A simple system that keeps it joyful:  

• Decide the total gifting budget first, then divide it among recipients. 

• Group recipients into tiers such as immediate family, extended family and family friends, then apply a consistent amount within each tier.

• Adjust the amount according to what you can comfortably afford. The meaning of the gesture does not depend on the amount given.  

For parents, receiving duit Deepavali also creates an opportunity to discuss how the money could be saved, spent or set aside. This can help establish a habit that outlasts the gift itself. A gift that starts a conversation about saving is worth more than the amount inside.

For those who include fireworks in their celebrations, the spectacle may last only a few moments, while a diya can burn steadily for much longer. The contrast offers a useful way to think about short-term excitement versus consistent financial habits.  

Financial decisions can also reflect these two approaches. The firework mode is the “one trade will change my life” thinking that often appears on social media. The diya mode is less dramatic: saving consistently, automating where appropriate and focusing on gradual progress. 

According to Bank Negara Malaysia's Financial Capability and Inclusion Demand Side Survey 2024, 61% of Malaysians reported difficulty raising RM1,000 for an emergency, compared with 47% in 2021.³

An emergency fund does not need to begin at six months of expenses. Budgeting coach Nafisah Amran advises starting small and building gradually, noting that consistency matters more than the amount, and that saving 5–10% is far better than quitting because you cannot hit 20%.⁴

Light one small lamp. Keep it burning. That is the whole strategy. ❤️‍🔥