APIB: World economy to make a comeback this year, led by China

KUALA LUMPUR: The global economy is expected to recover this year driven by support from governments worldwide and vaccine rollouts, led by China, according to Asia Pacific Investment Bank (APIB).

Its asset management department director Heow Gran Lai said China was the first globally significant economy to begin recovering from the COVID-19 crisis. China recorded a gross domestic product growth of 6.5 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2020 compared with the same period a year earlier, pushing its economic growth to 2.3 per cent for the full year.

Speaking at the webinar titled, ‘2021 Financial Outlook: Why You Should Be Optimistic,” tonight, he said the prospect of vaccines being available earlier than expected had cheered stock investors.

“We hope to have the vaccines as earlier as possible and whether it is 100 per cent effective or not, or yet to be tested, anyhow the existence of the vaccines will definitely help the recovery,” he said.

Furthermore, he believed that adequate fiscal and monetary policies introduced by the governments worldwide will be the engine of the growth.

“(Looking) at the progress today, we believe the neutral or moderate recovery more likely to happen (this year),” he said.

Statistically, Heow said China’s production level grew fast amid stability as both value added of the industrial enterprises and service production rebounded strongly since October 2020.

In fact, the year-on-year growth rate of both the downstream consumer goods industry and the upstream raw material industry increased significantly.