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Tag: GDP

  • Mobile contributed 6.2% to Bangladesh GDP in 2015

    Mobile contributed 6.2% to Bangladesh GDP in 2015

    Mobile technologies and services generated 6.2% of the GDP of Bangladesh in 2015, a contribution that amounted to around $13 billion of economic value, according to GSMA Intelligence.

    In the same year, mobile operators and the ecosystem provided employment to more than 760,000 people across Bangladesh, the report further stated. One-third of this was created directly in the ecosystem, while the rest is generated indirectly in other sectors as a result of the demand for production inputs generated by the mobile sector.

    “GSMA Intelligence findings clearly demonstrate the substantial contribution that mobile makes to the Bangladeshi economy,” GSMA head of spectrum Brett Tarnutzer said.

    “By systematically pursuing a policy framework that increases certainty, acknowledges market realities and removes regulatory barriers to investment and innovation, the Bangladeshi government and its citizens stand to achieve so much in the coming years.”

    In terms of public contribution, the mobile ecosystem generated about 10% of the government’s revenue in 2015, valued at $2.42 billion through general taxation, mobile-specific taxes, and spectrum licenses.

    Mobile’s overall impact includes the direct impact of the mobile ecosystem as well as the indirect impact and the increase in productivity brought about by the use of mobile technologies.

    GSMA added that Bangladesh performs close to the regional averages across metrics of mobile market development, despite a lower income than neighboring countries. Bangladesh is above the Asian average in terms of unique subscriber market penetration at 53%, while only slightly below with regard to mobile internet penetration at 33% and 3G at 20% of all mobile connections.

    Thus, it sees the potential for further growth if a supportive policy environment is put in place.

    GSMA Intelligence expects that the economic contribution of the mobile industry in Bangladesh will continue to increase. In value-added terms, it is estimated that the ecosystem will generate $17 billion by 2020. This forecast relies on a favorable macroeconomic environment and on a moderate expansion in demand and supply in the mobile market, as the number of mobile internet users and mobile coverage both increase.

    Employment opportunities are also set to expand from 780,000 jobs in 2016 to 850,000 jobs in 2020, an increase of around nine percent during that period.

    The amount of spectrum, and the terms on which it is made available, fundamentally drive the cost, range, and availability of mobile services. To ensure that this mobile vision becomes a reality, it is imperative that the spectrum is allocated in a way that encourages the rapid deployment of mobile broadband infrastructure, resulting in high quality, affordable mobile services for consumers across Bangladesh,” added Tarnutzer.

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  • Why obsessing over GDP is no longer in China’s best interests

    Why obsessing over GDP is no longer in China’s best interests

    China’s leadership has always seen gross domestic product (GDP) numbers as the most important indicator of their ability of govern; thus their whole apparatus does whatever it can, in terms of policies, to make sure a politically acceptable growth rate is achieved.

    With a persistent slowdown, the government has to adjust its target to a maximised but achievable goal. Between 2010 and 2015, the world’s second-largest economy witnessed a steady slowdown, with annual percentage growth rates of 10.5, 9.5, 7.9, 7.8, 7.3 and 6.9, respectively. Averaged annual GDP growth rates between 1989 and 2009 were around 10 per cent.

    Last year, the government set a range of 6.5 per cent to 7 per cent as a growth target, the lowest in decades. As expected, China is on track to meet that 2016 goal after three straight quarters of 6.7 per cent expansion.

    However, such growth was achieved with an expansive fiscal policy, higher government spending, a housing rally, ultra-loose monetary conditions and record bank lending, which have also led to an explosive increase in debt.

    Government spending from January to September 2016 was 12.5 per cent up on the same period a year earlier, while revenues increased by 5.9 per cent. Of the 8.2 per cent overall growth in fixed-asset investment in the period, state firms jumped by 21.1 per cent and private firms rose 2.5 per cent.

    In the previous year, state firms registered a much more moderate 10.9 per cent in fixed-asset investment, year on year, while private investment went up by 10.1 per cent.

    Recent growth has been achieved with the help of record bank lending, which is on pace to top 2015’s record 11.71 trillion yuan (HK$12.2 trillion). Last year, the central bank injected a net 1.5 trillion yuan into money markets through open market operations, many multiples of its net 10 billion yuan injection in 2015.

    The eased monetary policy helped stoke a housing boom that saw prices rise to a historic 12.6 per cent year on year in November and made houses in Chinese cities among the least affordable in the world.

    The state investment-fuelled growth led to alarming combined public and private debt of 260 per cent of GDP by the end of last year, the highest debt-to-GDP ratio in the world. The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) recently warned this was excessive and dangerous. In the first six months of last year, China’s domestic debt ratio rose by an astonishing 28 per cent of GDP.

    Last year the party set a target of 6.5 per cent annual growth for five years through to 2020, in its 13th five-year plan, just to meet the leadership’s promise of doubling the country’s economic size and per capita income from 2010 to 2020, a political symbol of building a “moderately prosperous society”.

    To support such short-term growth, the government had to delay, stall or even hold back some sorely needed reform measures which will help regain long-term growth momentum.

    Realising the challenge of taming asset bubbles, solving rising bad debt and checking unbalanced growth, the leadership recently pledged to shift its focus away from growth towards dealing with risks this year.

    If the leadership makes good on what they claimed – giving market forces a decisive role in the distribution of resources – they should abandon arbitrary growth targets, a remnant a Stalinist command economy.

    China’s economy is going through a critical transition, from manufacturing-oriented and state investment-fuelled expansion to service-centred and consumption-driven growth. What the government should do is push forward reforms that remove the obstacles to such transitions. ■

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  • South Korea Q3 GDP slows slightly, but better than forecast

    South Korea Q3 GDP slows slightly, but better than forecast

    The seasonally adjusted reading, down from a 0.8 percent gain in the second quarter, compared with a median 0.6 percent rise tipped in a Reuters survey.

    It also showed that facility investments fell 0.1 percent on-quarter in the July-September period, compared with a 2.8 percent on-quarter expansion three months earlier. On a sequential basis, the real GDP expanded 0.7 percent, slightly slower than the 0.8 percent growth recorded in the prior quarter.

    Despite the beat on both quarterly and year-on-year GDP, the Bank of Korea suggests growth could have been even better, citing troubles atelectronics giant Samsung following the release, then recall, of the Galaxy Note 7, along with industrial action at Hyundai.

    Services rose 1.0 percent in the September quarter from the previous three-month period, also better than a 0.6 percent gain in the second quarter, most likely thanks to government efforts to launch nationwide retail sale events to pry open wallets. On the other hand, exports grew 0.8 percent with rises in exports of chemical products and semiconductors. Capital investment slipped 0.1 percent, down from 2.8 percent growth in the previous quarter.

    Government consumption grew by 1.4%, in part due to an increase in health insurance benefits.

    It left the year-on-year expansion at 2.7%, down on the 3.3% rate reported in the previous quarter.

    A BOK official remained hopeful about Korea’s outlook, saying it could achieve 2.7 percent annual growth this year, as long as the economy does not contract any further.

    Both Chung and the ministry official agreed that fourth quarter growth would also be affected by Samsung’s decision to discontinue production of its fire-prone Galaxy Note 7 smartphone, although the economic impact from lost manufacturing was almost all reflected in the third quarter.

    Construction rose 4.4 percent sequentially, driven by a growth in building construction. LGERI projects 2.2 percent growth next year.

    “With China and European Union also likely to slow, Korea faces hard external conditions”, he said.

  • Here’s why Singapore can depend on F&B industry for economic growth

    Here’s why Singapore can depend on F&B industry for economic growth

    It contributes $14.4b to the city-state’s GDP.

    The food industry has done more than relieving hunger as it has also made huge impact in the overall economic growth of Singapore, contributing a bulk to the city-state’s GDP.

    According to the Food Industry Asia report by the Oxford Economics, F&B industry contributes an estimated $14.4 billion to GDP and employs nearly 300,000 people.

    The study revealed that overall impact of the food industry is dominated by food distribution.

    “The wholesale and retail of food, along with activities linked to Singapore’s 6,700 food service locations (which include restaurants, coffee shops and street hawker stands) account for two-thirds of the food industry’s GDP contribution, and four-fifths of the employment it supports,” the study said.

    Meanwhile, the food manufacturing industry has also made a huge impact on Singapore’s GDP, with its direct support for 38,800 jobs.

    In 2014, the food manufacturing industry earned S$9.8 billion from sales in Singapore.

    More so, food manufacturers’ supply chain spending within Singapore supported $1.6 billion of domestic procurement, $610 million of GDP, 6,100 jobs, $31 million in tax revenues, and S$37 million in Central Provident Fund contributions in the same year.

    “Based on the report’s findings, the food manufacturing industry is equivalent in size to Singapore’s aerospace industry, and larger than industries such as speciality chemicals, petrochemicals, medical technology and land transport engineering,” the study noted.
     

  • Philippine GDP growth surpasses China

    Philippine GDP growth surpasses China

    The Philippines has surpassed China in terms of GDP growth, for the first time in three decades, making the country the best performer in Asia* in Q1 2016.

    From 5 per cent in Q1 2015, Philippine GDP surged by 6.9 per cent in Q1 2016, the highest since the second quarter of 2013, said the National Economic and Development Authority.

    Philippine GDP growth outpaced China’s 6.7 per cent, Vietnam’s 5.5 per cent, Indonesia’s 4.9 per cent, Malaysia’s 4.2 per cent, Thailand’s 3.2 per cent, and Singapore’s 1.8 per cent economic growth in the quarter.

    Luisito Abueg, economics professor from De La Salle University Manila, said many factors contributed to the Philippines’ growth.

    “GDP may have been record high, but we have to account for the increased consumption component due to elections spending. It has been documented that during election periods, consumption increases, and with more created temporary jobs, more income circulates in the market,” said Abueg.

    Abueg said credits should not only go to the Aquino administration. “Some underlying components of growth may have been realized today, but the work of previous administrations are just now bearing fruit – the so called ‘lagged effects’ in economics and statistics.

    “That is why it is important that we should always have continuity: to continue the good, and to correct the bad. Not just to change everything just for the sake of credit-grabbing, which is a usual problem in Philippine politics, affecting economic directions.”

    Recently, Robinsons Retail, Jollibee, 7-Eleven and other retail companies reported profit growth for Q1 2016 citing election-related spending among other factors.

    With the country’s population projected to have reached 102.6 million in the first quarter of 2016, per capita GDP grew by 5.2 per cent from 3.2 per cent in the same quarter of 2015. Per capita household spending grew by 5.3 per cent from last year’s growth of 4.3 per cent, reported the Philippine Statistics Authority.

    The PSA said main growth driver was the services sector, which accelerated to 7.9 per cent from 5.5 per cent, while industry grew 8.7 percent from 5.3 per cent last year.

    On the other hand, the agriculture sector declined by 4.4 per cent, the fourth consecutive quarterly decline, from a growth of 1 per cent in the first quarter of 2015.

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  • Hong Kongs economic growth decelerates in Q1, risks to growth remain on downside in near term

    Hong Kongs economic growth decelerates in Q1, risks to growth remain on downside in near term

    Hong Kong registered GDP growth of 0.8% y/y in the first quarter of 2016, lower than consensus forecast. However, in quarter-on-quarter terms, the economic growth shrank 0.4%, as compared with 0.2% growth registered in the fourth quarter of 2015. The first quarter’s report suggests that the Hong Kong economy expanded at its slowest pace since 2012. The country’s trade performance is being quite impacted by the weak global demand. Hong Kong’s imports and exports both contracted sharply.

    Services exports weakened amid the deceleration of tourist arrivals and subdued spending by visitor. Hong Kong’s retail performance has been weighed on by major declines in tourist arrivals along with the relative strength of the HKD. Hong Kong’s retail sales continue to be in contraction for more than a year.

    The volatility in the global financial market has also impacted the country’s economic confidence and has been a drag on domestic demand. Private consumption expenditure grew marginally 1.1% y/y in the first quarter of 2016, as compared with the growth of 2.7% registered in the fourth quarter of 2015. Meanwhile, the property market weakened as transactions eased and prices fell.

    Hong Kong’s investment growth subtracted 2.3 percentage points from the headline GDP growth. It dropped 10.1% y/y, as compared to a contraction of 9.4% y/y in the previous quarter. Even if the relief measures stated in the 2016-2017 budget will give certain support to the economy, the risks to the economic growth continue to be tilted on the downside in the near term, noted HSBC in a research report.

    The economic growth is expected to be helped by the rapid growth in the US and stabilization in the Mainland economy in the coming quarter. The Hong Kong government has retained its growth and inflation forecast for 2016. It projects the economy to expand between 1% and 2%, whereas consumer price inflation is likely to be 2.3% this year.

    “We forecast overall GDP growth to slow to 1.5% in 2016, down from 2.4% in 2015”, added HSBC.

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  • China first quarter GDP growth slowest since 2009

    China first quarter GDP growth slowest since 2009

    The pace of China’s economic growth decreased to its lowest since the global financial crisis in the January to March period, official figures show. Gross domestic product expanded 6.7% from the same period a year ago, in line with market expectations but the slowest pace of growth recorded since the first quarter of 2009.

    The world’s second largest economy grew 6.9% last year – its weakest expansion in a quarter century – falling short of Beijing’s target of 7%. But the first quarter number falls within the range of Beijing’s growth target of 6.5% to 7% for 2016.

    Other data for March released by the National Bureau of Statistics suggested that the Chinese economy was stabilising, with industrial output, retail sales and urban fixed-asset investment all beating analyst forecasts.

    Industrial production rose 6.8% from a year earlier following a 5.4% increase in January-February, while retail sales jumped 10.5%. Fixed-asset investment expanded 10.7% in the three months to March period compared to the same period a year ago, beating expectations for a 10.5% rise.

    ‘Robust growth’

    The GDP data comes two days after China’s customs agency said exports increased 11.5% from a year earlier in March, the first positive growth in overseas shipments in nine months. Imports were down a less-than-expected 7.6% following a 13.8% drop in the previous month, while the trade surplus came in at $29.9bn (£21bn; €26.3bn).

    Yuan Banknotes
    China’s central bank says it will target stability in the yuan exchange rateReuters

    Meanwhile, a Chinese deputy central bank governor said the economy had performed robustly in the first quarter but admitted that it faced several headwinds.

    “I’m pretty confident that we are going to have between 6.5% to 7% growth this year,” Yi Gang said. He reiterated that the central bank would target stability in the yuan and not allow the currency to “overshoot” its exchange rate by too much.

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  • China on track for a more sustainable economic expansion

    China on track for a more sustainable economic expansion

    Investors world-over fear that China could record another worse-than-expected slowdown this year. Over the past two decades, annual GDP growth in China has averaged around an impressive 10 percent, underpinned mostly by investments, as well as exports. The IMF expects China to account for almost 18 per cent of world economic activity in 2016. Hence a bump in China’s economy can definitely not be ignored. A drop in China’s growth rate from an expansion of more than 10 per cent in 2010 to 6.3 per cent expected this year could directly knock-off about 0.75 percentage points off the global growth rate.

    The recent week’s turmoil in China has hit both stocks and currency markets, sending shock-waves through global financial markets. Stock indexes around the world have seen massive sell-offs, global markets have fallen by 7.1% since January 1st, their worst ever start to a year. The instability brings back to light China’s stock market crash and a surprise Yuan devaluation by Beijing in August 2015 which sparked a global rout, and wiped out trillions of U.S. dollars in value from Chinese equities.

    Some of China’s leading economic indicators, such as its manufacturing index and factory output, are indeed slowing. This is a rational slowdown which would deliver a healthier and more sustainable growth path. The emerging markets and the rest of the world may just have to the deal with the “new normal” of global growth as the Asian giant seeks a slower, but more sustainable, economic expansion.

    Markets will keep focus on China data-deluge, including the GDP, industrial production and retail sales due tomorrow. Expectations are for data to remain weak. Barclays forecasts Q4 GDP growth data to have slowed further to 6.6 % y/y (consensus: 6.9%) from 6.9% in Q3. Industrial production is likely to have moderated, (Barclays: +5.9%y/y; consensus: 6.0%), retail sales (+11%y/y) and fixed asset investment (+10.1%y/y).

    PBoC has strongly signaled a desire for near-term stability by keeping its USD/CNY fixings stable at about 6.56 over the past week. On Monday, the PBoC said they will start implementing RRR to some banks involved in the offshore yuan market, in a move that seemed intended to soak up additional liquidity. The spot market opened at 6.5800 per dollar on Monday and was trading at 6.5792 in early trade, 48 pips below the previous close and 0.31 percent away from the midpoint, which was set at 6.559. The offshore yuan was trading -0.18 percent away from the onshore spot at 6.591 per dollar, firmer than the previous day’s close of 6.6165.

     

  • China retail sales to increase 10.7 per cent

    China retail sales to increase 10.7 per cent

    China’s retail sales, a key gauge of domestic consumption, is likely to post slower growth this year compared with 2014, commerce ministry said.

    Retail sales may expand around 10.7 per cent in 2015, Shen Danyang, spokesman at the Ministry of Commerce, told a news conference in Beijing today, without giving a reason. Retail sales rose 12 per cent last year.

    In the first 11 months of 2015, retail sales grew 10.6 per cent from a year earlier. In November, retail sales increased by an annual 11.2 per cent — the strongest monthly expansion this year.

    China’s external outlook remains gloomy. Chinese firms said global demand this year was worse than that during 2008-09 financial crisis, as per a recent survey by commerce ministry of more than 6,000 firms in 70 key industries.

    Subdued external demand, rising costs, slowing investment growth and the yuan’s appreciation have all weighed on China’s trade performance this year, Shen said.

    “Feedback from firms showed foreign trade was extremely difficult this year.”

    China’s net exports are likely to contribute around 12.3 per cent to the increase in the country’s GDP this year, he said, citing data from a research unit under his ministry.

    China’s trade remained weak in November with exports falling a worse-than-expected 6.8 per cent from a year earlier and imports tumbling 8.7 per cent.