October export falls to lowest this year

[webfact]

October export falls to lowest this year



BANGKOK: -- Export figures for October this year declined in excess of 8%, the lowest for the entire year, according to the Thai National Shippers’ Council yesterday.

Council president Nopporn Thepsittha said yesterday revealed that Thailand’s exports for October 2015 contracted by 8.11% amounting to a drop in excess of US$18.5 billion in total.

He stated that this was the lowest drop in export figures for the entire year and estimated that for the remaining two months of the year, exports would continue to contract by 3%.

In total, he estimated that yearly export figures for 2015 will have fallen by 5%, the lowest annual statistic in a six-year period.

Significantly, this represented a three year continuous drop in exports for the country and would raise concerns that exports next year will encounter difficulties for growth.

He predicts next year’s exports growing by less than 2% citing 3 major factors contributing to the shortfall.

First is the current economic troubles hitting the EU, Japan and China, followed by the increasingly turbulent global political climate and finally the incremental increase in terrorism and natural disasters all over the world.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/october-export-falls-to-lowest-this-year


-- Thai PBS 2015-12-01

[lovelomsak]

He predicts next year’s exports growing by less than 2% citing 3 major factors contributing to the shortfall.

First is the current economic troubles hitting the EU, Japan and China, followed by the increasingly turbulent global political climate and finally the incremental increase in terrorism and natural disasters all over the world.

Is it not nice these are the only reasons.

[Thailand]

This will not bring happiness to the ptb!

[jerojero]

Of course nothing to do with an overvalued currency. Exports can grow amid a global recession if your currency is in line with economic reality.

[NCC1701A]

did the bank of thailand get this memo?

[chrisrazz]

Good news. This is the lowest drop in export figures for the whole year. A Thai spokesman polishing a turd, how unusual?

[Roota]

A Thai spokesman polishing a turd, how unusual?

Hardly. He's talking about how bad it is. Admittedly, a crap translation - the original Thai makes it clear that by 'lowest" they mean 'worst'.

I suspect that if more people here read the news in Thai they'd be surprised how candid Thai government and industry spokesmen can be, sometimes at least.

[overherebc]

did the bank of thailand get this memo?

Yes, but figuring out how to buy loads of dollars or sterling on the QT hasnt been worked out yet.

[waldroj]

I’m staggered that Nopporn forgot to mention that despite to gloomy Export figures, Thailand should be able to maintain its balance of trade figures (for now).

This would sound good, except that the reason is that Imports (other than tourists) have nose-dived more than Exports, and the trend suggests more of the same into the future!

Seems the locals can't afford those luxury imported items anymore. They can't be too happy about that!

[Srikcir]

"yearly export figures for 2015 will have fallen by 5%"

Based on tourism revenues from The Nation 2015-09-11, this lost revenue would require about an additional 8 million international visitors. That's about a 30% increase needed in 2016 over this year's 30 million.

The Office National Economic and Social Development Board projects 32 million visitors for 2016 or about increase of about 7%.

SHORTFALL - Tourism alone is not going to recover the economy in 2016.

Unless the government can significantly reverse falling exports next year, it will likely suffer a massive deficit. Continued borrowing from foreign countries to pay for more insfrastructure projects will only exacerbate that deficit. But there are some major potential factors such as EU ban on Thai seafoods, USA Tier 3 tariff sanctions and political strife that could further depress GDP growth.

Not a good time for foreign investment.

[farangmick]

Be a lot worse if other countries imposed tariffs on Thai goods the way Thailand does on imports from them.

[Roota]

Based on tourism revenues from The Nation 2015-09-11, this lost revenue would require about an additional 8 million international visitors.

Only if tourism was Thailand's only foreign exchange earner. In fact international tourism receipts account for only about 17% of Thailand's exports, according to the World Bank. The main problem right now is a big downturn in agriculture and agribusiness products, down about 8% year-on-year. Industrial goods are down too, but only by about half that. Both are bigger industries here than tourism.

For anyone who imagines that Thailand is a kind of insignificant banana-republic economy (for the moment let's ignore its other, undeniably banana-republic aspects), I suggest a visit to OEC. It's the 2nd biggest economy in SE Asia and as of 2013 was the world's 23rd largest export economy. The 'Trade Balance' graph especially should be an eye-opener. Hitting a rough patch now, but the record is impressive.

[waldroj]

Roota

While the trade figures to 2013 were impressive, from 2014 to the present the story is not so good. See my plot from Bank of Thailand data in #9 above.

[tribalfusion001]

Not many posts to this interesting topic on Thailand's economic slide.

[LivinLOS]

News just in.. Suan Dusit poll says 95% of respondents say exports are up 28%..