South Korean exports offered an early sign of improvement in global trade after their first year-on-year gain since last summer.
Preliminary trade data showed a 5.3 percent gain in exports in the first 20 days of this month from a year earlier for the first increase since August last year, a possible sign that a slowdown in world demand is starting to ease.
The rise was largely driven by gains in auto and shipping-related exports, while semiconductor exports continued to drop.
Photo: EPA-EFE
As a key provider of chips and smartphones for the global economy, South Korea’s export data offer one of the earliest pulse checks on the strength of international trade and tech-sector demand.
While the figures were encouraging, it is too early to gauge how fast any recovery might be, Australia and New Zealand Banking Group economist Krystal Tan (譚恩) said.
“But it does look like we’re nearing a bottom,” Tan said.
An improvement in the nation’s shipments can be a leading indicator for the wider trend, although economists warn against drawing concrete conclusions from an incomplete set of monthly figures.
“The data indicates global trade may have bottomed out, but whether it is set for a full-on recovery will be something to be watched,” said Moon Jung-hiu, economist at KB Kookmin Bank in Seoul.
Gains were led largely by shipments to the US, steady demand for automobiles and a jump in shipping-related demand.
Exports to the EU and Hong Kong also advanced on a year-on-year basis, although shipments to China were down again.
The results fit in with a picture of a US economy showing resilience, despite a string of rate hikes, while China’s recovery continues to disappoint even as policymakers there ramp up stimulus to try and restore momentum.
A full recovery in global trade depends largely on China — a major engine of the world economy — and a resurgence in appetite for chips, which go into everything from vehicles to electronic devices.
The figures have to be taken “with a grain of salt and can be seen as US exports stabilizing rather than a surge,” Tan said.
Even with the gain, overall exports were still about 18 percent lower from their 20-day peak in March last year.
A measure of average daily exports, which removes potential distortions from changes in the number of working days, also showed that shipments were not as strong as the headline figure indicated.
The average inched down 2 percent, although that was the smallest fall since exports began to drop last year.
The 20-day data showed that auto exports more than doubled. Shipping-related demand, a factor that sometimes skews monthly figures, was also up by more than 100 percent.
While semiconductor exports fell 23.5 percent, the drop eased compared with last month’s full month figures.
Overall imports declined 11.2 percent, resulting in a trade deficit of US$1.61 billion.
TECH BOOST: New TSMC wafer fabs in Arizona are to dramatically improve US advanced chip production, a report by market research firm TrendForce said With Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) pouring large funds into Arizona, the US is expected to see an improvement in its status to become the second-largest maker of advanced semiconductors in 2027, Taipei-based market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said in a report last week. TrendForce estimates the US would account for a 21 percent share in the global advanced integrated circuit (IC) production market by 2027, sharply up from the current 9 percent, as TSMC is investing US$65 billion to build three wafer fabs in Arizona, the report said. TrendForce defined the advanced chipmaking processes as the 7-nanometer process or more
Who would not want a social media audience that grows without new content? During the three years she paused production of her short do-it-yourself (DIY) farmer’s lifestyle videos, Chinese vlogger Li Ziqi (李子柒), 34, has seen her YouTube subscribers increase to 20.2 million from about 14 million. While YouTube is banned in China, her fan base there — although not the size of YouTube’s MrBeast, who has 330 million subscribers — is close to 100 million across the country’s social media platforms Douyin (抖音), Sina Weibo (新浪微博) and Xiaohongshu (小紅書). When Li finally released new videos last week — ending what has
OPEN SCIENCE: International collaboration on math and science will persevere even if the incoming Trump administration imposes strict controls, Nvidia’s CEO said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said on Saturday that global cooperation in technology would continue even if the incoming US administration imposes stricter export controls on advanced computing products. US president-elect Donald Trump, in his first term in office, imposed restrictions on the sale of US technology to China citing national security — a policy continued under US President Joe Biden. The curbs forced Nvidia, the world’s leading maker of chips used for artificial intelligence (AI) applications, to change its product lineup in China. The US chipmaking giant last week reported record-high quarterly revenue on the back of strong AI chip
Qualcomm Inc’s interest in pursuing an acquisition of Intel Corp has cooled, people familiar with the matter said, upending what would have likely been one of the largest technology deals of all time. The complexities associated with acquiring all of Intel has made a deal less attractive to Qualcomm, said some of the people, asking not to be identified discussing confidential matters. It is always possible Qualcomm looks at pieces of Intel instead or rekindles its interest later, they added. Representatives for Qualcomm and Intel declined to comment. Qualcomm made a preliminary approach to Intel on a possible takeover, Bloomberg News and other media