January retail sales rise 7.8% - Singapore

January retail sales rise 7.8% - Singapore

By MATTHEW PHAN

SINGAPORE’S retail sales in January rose 7.8 per cent year on year, the Department of Statistics said yesterday. Points of brisk business: Sales at supermarkets jumped 19.1 per cent in January, while department stores saw a 20.9 per cent year-on-year rise in sales It added that retail sales rose just 1.5 per cent if adjusted for inflation.

This is ‘hardly consistent with booming consumption’, said HSBC economist Robert Prior-Wandesforde.

‘Growing concern about inflation, unevenly distributed income gains and the weakness of the equity market could be other explanations for the softness in spending, although surprisingly soft retail sales has been a feature of the Singapore economy for at least 18 months now,’ he said in a note.

At 7.8 per cent, the January jump was still stronger than the 4.3 per cent and 1.9 per cent falls in real terms seen in November and December 2007 respectively, Mr Prior-Wandesforde noted.
Excluding motor vehicles, retail sales in January were 15.1 per cent higher.
The strongest increases were seen in sales of petrol, food and beverages, and at department stores and supermarkets.

Petrol sales rose 41.1 per cent, though this was clearly due to the effect of prices, as petrol sales rose only 5.5 per cent in real terms, according to the SingStat release.
Department store sales were up 20.9 per cent, an increase HSBC described as ‘huge’, while supermarket sales were up 19.1 per cent.

In real terms, they were up 15.9 per cent and 12.8 per cent respectively.

Food and beverages saw a year-on-year rise in retail sales of 20.5 per cent, or 14.7 per cent after accounting for inflation.

Meanwhile, retail sales in other segments, like motor vehicles and recreational goods, declined.
Motor vehicle sales fell by 5.3 per cent, or by 10.1 per cent in real terms, while sales of recreational goods dipped 1.7 per cent, or 3.9 per cent in real terms.

After adjusting for inflation, sales of jewellery and at provision and sundry shops also dipped slightly.

The good news for the economy is that exports and manufacturing production bounced back very strongly in January, following the distortions of the fourth quarter, and it is ’still realistic to expect a very strong bounce in first-quarter Singapore GDP’, said Mr Prior-Wandesforde.
The Republic could even see a double-digit quarter-on-quarter seasonally adjusted annualised rise in first quarter GDP, he said.Source : Business Times - 15 March 2008

Singapore Property - Buy , Sell , Rent , Invest
Jerry Hansin (+65)90275537
jerry@assetomgt.com