Singapore's non-oil domestic exports up 18.4% in December, easing from November

SINGAPORE'S key exports continued growing for the 13th straight month in December, although momentum has eased slightly from the previous month.

Non-oil domestic exports (NODX) rose 18.4 per cent year on year with the help of both electronic and non-electronics, but this was slower than November's 24.2 per cent growth, according to data released by Enterprise Singapore (ESG) on Monday (Jan 17).

Still, December's showing came as a surprise to private-sector economists, who expected a 12.9 per cent growth, according to a Bloomberg poll.

The export of electronic products expanded by 13.6 per cent in December, compared with the 29.2 per cent jump in the previous month. Integrated circuits, personal computers and disk media products contributed the most to this growth, ESG said.

Non-electronic exports grew 19.9 per cent, extending November's 22.6 per cent rise. The agency said the expansion came mostly from pharmaceuticals, specialised machinery and petrochemicals.

On a seasonally-adjusted month-on-month basis, NODX rose 3.7 per cent in December, faster than the previous month's 1 per cent. Non-electronic exports grew, while that for electronics fell.

On the whole, exports reached S$17.1 billion in December after seasonal adjustment, higher than the S$16.5 billion seen in November.

ESG noted that NODX to Singapore's top markets as a whole rose in December, although exports to the US and South Korea declined.

The largest contributors to the rise in exports were China, Indonesia and the European Union.

In particular, exports to China rose by 36.3 per cent, with pharmaceuticals surging a whopping 732.2 per cent.

Meanwhile, oil domestic exports jumped 62.4 per cent in December, helped by the low base from a year ago, but this was slower than the 115.9 per cent surge in November.

On the whole, total trade expanded by 31.4 per cent in December, extending the 31.3 per cent rise in the previous month.

Sequentially, total trade rose 4.2 per cent in December, coming in at a faster clip than November's 2.7 per cent.

UOB economist Barnabas Gan noted that Singapore's export and manufacturing environment remained largely buoyant in 2021 despite Covid-19-related risks and restrictions.

"This is mainly due to the resilient export demand for Singapore's electronic and non-electronic products, as seen from the strong performance for the whole of last year," Gan said, adding that Singapore's high vaccination rate makes it well-positioned to ride the endemic-Covid-19 recovery into 2022.

Jung Sung Eun, a senior economist at Oxford Economics, said export momentum could lose some steam as external headwinds persist.

"With foreign demand growth slowing, we forecast imports will outpace exports in 2022, which will result in net trade dragging on GDP (gross domestic product) growth. But we think domestic demand will continue to recover, helping to support GDP growth of 3.6 per cent this year," said Jung.