Manufacturing production in Singapore unexpectedly declined by 0.2 percent year-on-year in September of 2018, after an upwardly revised 3.7 percent growth in August and missing market consensus of a 3.5 percent rise. It was the first drop in manufacturing output since December 2017, as production contracted for: electronics (-5.5 pct vs 5.9 pct vs 5.1 pct in August); biomedical manufacturing (-9.7 pct vs 1.6 pct); chemicals (-7.1 pct vs 5.9 pct); and general manufacturing (-2.7 pct vs -5.7 pct). Meantime, production growth slowed for precision engineering (4.1 pct vs 5.8 pct), while picked up strongly for transport engineering (39.4 pct vs 5 pct). On a seasonally adjusted monthly basis, factory output shrank 4.9 percent, compared to an upwardly revised 2.2 percent fall in August and worse than estimates of a 1.8 drop. It is the third straight month of drop in monthly figure. Industrial Production in Singapore averaged 7.06 percent from 1984 until 2018, reaching an all time high of 58.60 percent in May of 2010 and a record low of -32.20 percent in March of 2009.
Industrial Production in Singapore is expected to be 3.70 percent by the end of this quarter, according to Trading Economics global macro models and analysts expectations. Looking forward, we estimate Industrial Production in Singapore to stand at 7.60 in 12 months time. In the long-term, the Singapore Manufacturing Production is projected to trend around 13.00 percent in 2020, according to our econometric models.