Malaysia’s external trade figure likely to remain volatile
KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s monthly external trade figure is expected to continue its volatility, influenced by the base and calendar effects as well as the impact of zero-rated Goods and Services Tax (GST) on imports.
Maybank Investment Bank Bhd (Maybank IB) said May’s export and import growth were affected by the high bases in the same period last year, which grew 32.4 and 30.2 per cent year-on-year (y-o-y), respectively.
In June last year, export and import growth decelerated to 9.9 and 3.7 per cent y-o-y, respectively, which should create low base effect for last month’s figures.
“We see imports surging during the ‘consumption tax holiday’ months of June to August as businesses take advantage of the zerorated GST to make their purchases before it is replaced by the Sales and Services Tax in September ,” it said.
Export growth slowed to 3.4 per cent y-o-y and import growth stalled at 0.1 per cent y-o-y in May compared with the same period last year, while trade surplus of RM8.1 billion in May was sustained at 47.1 per cent y-o-y.
On global trade, the firm has forecast slower external trade growth this year with 6.3 per cent export growth and 3.0 per cent import growth, which would result in a RM131 billion trade surplus.