KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's record-breaking trade figures in October and the first 10 months increase the possibility that its overall performance this year will be better than expected, analysts said.
The country's export surpassed RM1 trillion in just 10 months, increasing 25 per cent to RM1.004 trillion and exceeded the overall exports in 2020.
The figure even surpassed the highest annual export value ever recorded in 2018, Senior Minister and Minister of International Trade and Industry Datuk Seri Mohamed Azmin Ali said.
For the first 10 months of 2021, trade expanded 23.5 per cent to RM1.80 trillion from the same period last year, azmin said in a statement today.
For October, Malaysia's trade expanded 26.5 per cent to RM202.61 billion compared to October 2020, breaching RM200 billion mark for the first time and was the ninth consecutive month of double-digit growth since February 2021.
Exports rose 25.5 per cent to RM114.43 billion, the 14th consecutive month of year-on-year (Y-o-Y) expansion since September 2020.
Imports was higher by 27.9 per cent to RM88.18 billion, leading to a 17.9 per cent trade surplus to RM26.25 billion during the month.
"Foreign trade increased to a new record high in October 2021. Malaysia's total trade increased further by 26.5 per cent yoy to a historical high of RM202.6 billion as both exports and imports increased to record highs of US$114.4 billion and US$88.2 billion, respectively. Exports expanded faster at 25.5 per cent yoy in October 2021 (September 2021: 24.7 per cent yoy), underpinned by robust external demand from China, Japan, and Europe," MIDF Research said.
"The robust growth in October suggests a steady expansion in the external trade activity and increases the possibility that overall performance this year may be better than expected. For now, we maintain our projection for exports to grow at 19.8 per cent this year (2020: -1.1 pet cent) and keep full-year imports growth unchanged at 18.9 per cent (2020: -5.8 per cent)," the firm added.
Elaborating on the performance, Azmin said export growth was boosted mainly by higher shipments of petroleum products, manufactures of metal, electrical and electronic (E&E) products, chemicals and chemical products as well as palm oil and palm oil-based agriculture products.
"Exports of manufactures of metal and E&E products registered the highest monthly value thus far."
He said exports to major markets notably Asean, China, the US, the European Union (EU) and Japan recorded double-digit growth with exports to Asean registering the highest monthly value.
On a month-on-month (M-o-M) basis, trade, exports, imports and trade surplus grew 3.6 per cent, 3.2 per cent, 4.1 per cent and 0.5 per cent respectively.
Imports rose 21.8 per cent to RM801.17 billion and trade surplus surged by 39.2 per cent to RM202.58 billion during the first 10 months.
"Trade, exports, imports and trade surplus registered the highest value for the period," he said.
Azmin said major exports in October 2021 were E&E products which were valued at RM42.01 billion, an increase of 8.8 per cent from October 2020, and accounted for 36.7 per cent of total exports.
This followed by petroleum products valued at RM9.88 billion, a surge of 126 per cent from October 2020, accounting for 8.6 per cent of total exports and manufactures of metal worth RM7.78 billion, a rise of 146.9 per cent Y-o-Y, and constituting 6.8 per cent of total exports.
Exports of palm oil and palm oil-based agriculture products grew 34.6 per cent to RM7.36 billion, making up 6.4 per cent of total export, while chemicals and chemical products exports jumped 58.9 per cent to RM6.61 billion, accounting for 5.8 per cent of total exports.