The nation’s economy last quarter accelerated 3.29 percent from a year earlier, as exports and private consumption turned out stronger than expected, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
The results beat the government’s May estimate of 3.08 percent and allowed the agency to raise its growth projection for this year from 2.6 to 2.65 percent, DGBAS senior executive officer Huang Wei-jie (黃偉傑) said.
However, DGBAS has to weigh in other factors when revising its GDP projection on Aug. 17, he said.
External demand contributed 46.2 percent to growth during the April-to-June period, while domestic demand accounted for 53.8 percent, DGBAS data showed.
Exports rose 11.22 percent in the first six months of the year, as a continued global economic pickup fostered demand for new technology applications and drove firms to adopt automation, Huang said.
Shipments of base metal, plastic, chemical and mineral products increased by double digit percentages, supported by increases in oil and material prices, DGBAS said.
On the domestic front, a stable job market helped boost average wages by 3.2 percent and local shares by 8.27 percent with daily turnover swelling 56.61 percent year-on-year, the agency said.
The effects of positive wealth helped expand retail sales by 4.58 percent and dining revenues by 5.42 percent, it said, adding that the number of outbound visits increased 8.91 percent.
However, capital formation last quarter came in weaker than expected, contracting 2.35 percent year-on-year, compared with the previous estimate of a 0.89 percent increase, DGBAS said.
Conservative capital spending by local semiconductor firms softened the effects of increased investment in transportation equipment and construction works, it said.
Overall, the first half of the year saw a stable expansion in the domestic economy and Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ) said the stronger-than-expected showing for last quarter has prompted it to revise its growth forecast from 1.7 to 2.3 percent for this year.
However, the strong exports might partly stem from front-loading activities by companies in response to uncertainty over US tariffs on Chinese goods, ANZ said.
Export orders contracted last month, suggesting a potential downturn in the global electronics supply chain, it said.
Domestic demand also faced downside risks, with private consumption increasing only 2.65 percent in the second quarter, down from 2.73 percent in the first quarter, ANZ said.
In the absence of concrete policy changes to stimulate domestic demand, the slowdown is likely to continue in the second half of the year, it said.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained