LI up, economy shows confidence for further growth
KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s leading index (LI) rebounded 5.3% year-on-year (y-o-y) to 111.7 points in June 2022, after a rise of 2.3% in May 2022 (111.3 points), according to the Statistics Department.
It said the increase was mainly backed by the increment in real imports of other basic precious and other non-ferrous metals, driven by the import of platinum-based metals and influenced by the low base effect from the previous year (June 2021: 106.1 points).
“Concomitantly, the monthly change of LI increased 0.4% in the reference month, attributed mainly by real imports of other basic precious and other non-ferrous metals (0.6%) and the number of new companies registered (0.6%),” it said in a statement yesterday.
It said that in June 2022, the LI – which shows the ability to anticipate the future direction of the economy – signals confidence towards further growth in the coming months through smoothed long-term trend index movements that are intact above 100.0 points.
“This is in line with the anticipated promising signs of strong domestic and export demand as well as the reopening of international borders amid slow global economic growth,” it said.
For the current economic scenario, the coincident index (CI) spiked 12.6% y-o-y to record 121.5 points in June 2022, in tandem with the economic performance in the second quarter of this year where strong growth was recorded in June 2022, it said. The department said that furthermore, the CI registered 0.2% month-on-month, led by the increases in industrial production index (0.9%), capacity utilisation in the manufacturing sector (0.7%) and total employment in the manufacturing sector (0.2%).
“The diffusion index for LI recorded 42.9% in June 2022.
“At the same time, the diffusion index for CI remained at 100% since December 2021, representing that all the CI components increased over the past six months,” it added.
The full publication of the Malaysian Economic Indicators: Leading, Coincident & Lagging Indexes, June 2022 report can be downloaded through estatistik portal.