A intent of Marina Bay Sands at sunrise on Sept. 18, 2016 in Singapore.
Rustam Azmi |Getty Images
Singapore’s economy accomplished badly in the second quarter, with the slowest annual growth in a decade and sharp shrinkage from the previous three months as the creating sector continued to decline, preliminary data showed on Friday.
From a year earlier, gross domestic outcome (GDP) expanded 0.1% in the second quarter, well below the 1.1% forecast in a Reuters poll and the revised 1.1% progress for January-March.
This is the slowest year-on-year GDP growth since the second quarter of 2009, when it fell 1.2%.
On a quarterly, seasonally arranged and annualized basis, GDP shrank 3.4% in April-June from the previous three months, the Ministry of Trade and Industry verbalized in an emailed statement.
A Reuters poll had forecast a marginal on quarter expansion of 0.1%. In the first quarter, GDP expanded 3.8% from the before-mentioned quarter.
This is the biggest quarterly contraction in nearly seven years, since a 4.1% fall in the third board of 2012 from the quarter earlier on a seasonally adjusted and annualized basis.
The second quarter flash numbers are “utterly disastrous… way below even the worst street forecasts,” said Selena Ling, head of treasury and procedure at OCBC Bank, adding that the main drag remains manufacturing.
In the second quarter, manufacturing contracted 3.8% from a year earlier after shrivel up 0.4% in the quarter earlier.
Singapore authorities have previously said they will review their 2019 full-year GDP swelling of 1.5%-2.5%, and some analysts say there might be a recession in 2020.
Ling said she expects authorities to soon moderate full-year growth forecasts to 0.5-1.5%.
Electronics manufacturing output, the main driver of Singapore’s economy in the last two years, declined for the sixth consecutive month in May while exports saw its largest decline in more than three years.
Singapore’s sluggish growth outlook has economists raising bets on the important bank easing its exchange-rate based monetary policy in its next policy statement, due in October.
The MAS tightened monetary way twice last year in efforts to control rising price pressures and strengthen its currency — its first such tightening removes in six years.
The Singapore dollar weakened slightly on the GDP news, reaching S$1.3585 from S$1.3570 before paring the reduction.