Taiwanese businesses reportedly feel more pessimistic about their prospects over the coming six months, dragged down by poor trading data at home and abroad, the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER, 台經院) said yesterday.
The business sentiment gauge for the manufacturing industry dropped to 89.97 last month, down 0.47 percentage points from a revised 90.44 in August, as inventory adjustments lingered on, the monthly survey showed.
The number of manufacturers with dim views about business outlook increased 4.6 percentage points to 30.5 percent last month, while companies with positive outlooks dropped 6.3 percentage points to 15 percent, the survey found.
“The absence of an increase in orders accounted for the downturn in sentiment,” TIER Economic Forecasting Center director Gordon Sun (孫明德) said, adding that the situation might not improve in the foreseeable future.
In particular, printing and garment companies are gloomy about the economic landscape going forward, the survey found.
The sentiment reading for the service industry stood at 82.1 last month, down from a revised 83.96 in August, the survey showed.
Logistics service providers and warehouses have the weakest sentiment due to faltering exports and imports, Sun said.
The softening sentiment among service providers might weigh on private consumption, which the government is counting on to sustain this year’s GDP showing, the economist said.
However, monetary easing by Europe and China is set to continue driving global funds to equities markets in Asia, lending support to the local bourse, Sun said.
The climate gauge for the construction industry weakened 0.77 percentage points to 79.86 last month, as persistent pricing gaps continued to slow transactions, the survey showed.
Presale projects fared worse than existing homes because the former are more vulnerable to political and policy uncertainty, the Taipei-based think tank said.
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