Exports are forecast to grow slightly this month, marking the first year-on-year increase after 17 consecutive months of contraction, the Ministry of Finance said.
Ministry officials said last month’s export figures are expected to rise, on the back of recovering demand for electronics and a slower decline in the export of minerals and other major products.
The ministry is today to release the nation’s trade figures for last month.
Mineral product exports in July last year fell more than 50 percent, or US$970 million, from a year earlier, ministry statistics show.
However, the figures have been improving this year and are likely to end 17 months of declines, the ministry said.
Yuanta-Polaris Research Institute (元大寶華綜經院) president Liang Kuo-yuan (梁國源) said that he expects last month’s export figures to show monthly and annual growth.
“It appears that exports have recovered their momentum,” he said.
However, the increase is likely to be smaller than that of July 2014, when the pending release of Apple Inc’s iPhone 6 smartphones boosted shipments by Taiwanese exporters, he said.
In June, exports fell 2.1 percent from a year earlier to US$22.89 billion, the smallest decline since February last year, the ministry said, attributing the slow pace of contraction to increasing demand for technology products.
Exports of non-technology products remained weak, the ministry added.
Trade figures might return to positive territory this month, as demand spurred by inventory-building looks healthy and sustainable, if Brexit and other downside risks prove to be controllable, Department of Statistics Director-General Yeh Maan-tzwu (葉滿足) said last month.
Virtual-reality, handheld and Internet of Things products are acting as catalysts to an upward trend that might further improve with the expected launches of Apple’s next-generation iPhone, iPad and other products next month, Yeh said.
In the first half, exports totaled US$131.33 billion, down by 9.1 percent from the same period last year, while imports declined 10.7 percent year-on-year to US$107.3 billion, and the trade surplus dropped US$270 million from last year to US$24.03 billion, the ministry said.
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