News Room - Business/Economics

Posted on 06 Aug 2009

June exports down 22.6% to RM45.1bil (Malaysia)

Malaysia’s June exports of RM45.1bil, which was the highest monthly export value registered this year, was 22.6% down year-on-year, according to the International Trade and Industry Ministry.

 

This was lower than the median forecast of 25% from Bloomberg’s survey of 17 economists.

 

Imports dropped 20.8% to RM35.99bil while trade surplus stood at RM9.12bil. Total trade declined 21.8% to RM81.09bil in June versus a year ago.

 

Month-on-month, exports increased 5.1% due to higher manufactured exports such as electrical and electronic (E&E) products, machinery, appliances and parts, while imports rose 9.4%.

 

RAM Holdings Bhd chief economist Dr Yeah Kim Leng noted that although the contraction in exports year-on-year remained high, there had been some improvement versus the previous months.

 

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“The rate of contraction has stabilised and should improve gradually going forward as mirrored by the performance of other Asian exporting countries such as South Korea, China and Taiwan,” he said.

 

However, he cautioned that the double-digit contraction in exports suggested that the recovery in global demand remained subdued and it could be a while before exports returned to pre-crisis levels.

 

TA Research economist Patricia Oh said the export and import contractions were “better than expected”. “My forecast was a 27% decline in exports and 28.1% drop in imports. Exports should be better as demand continues to grow in the E&E sector.”

 

The country’s major exports in June included E&E products valued at RM18.59bil or 41.2% of total exports, palm oil worth RM3.65bil or 8.1% and chemicals and chemical products of RM2.8bil or 6.2%.

 

Singapore, China, the United States, Japan and Thailand were the top five export destinations accounting for 52.1% of total exports.

 

However, exports to the United States fell 29.4% to RM5bil in June year-on-year mainly due to lower export of E&E products while exports to the European Union dropped 25.8% to RM4.64bil from lower exports of E&E products, chemicals and chemical products, crude rubber and machinery, appliances and parts.

 

For imports, intermediate goods made up 70.3% or RM25.29bil, capital goods comprised 13.7% or RM4.93bil and consumption goods contributed 7.3% or RM2.63bil.

 

During the first six months of the year, exports decreased 23.4% to RM250.53bil compared with the same period last year while imports were lower by 26.3% to RM191.3bil.