Chart of the Day: Wholesale, retail sectors are losers in growth rate race

It contracted by 1.5%.

According to the Ministry of Trade and Industry's Economic Survey of Singapore 2012, the economy grew by 1.5 per cent in the fourth quarter, following the flat growth recorded in the third quarter.

On a quarter-on-quarter seasonally-adjusted annualised basis, real gross domestic product (GDP) increased by 3.3 per cent, reversing the 4.6 per cent decline in the
previous quarter.

The manufacturing sector contracted by 1.1 per cent in the fourth quarter, following the 1.4 per cent decline in the preceding quarter.

The smaller decline was largely due to a rebound in the output of the biomedical manufacturing and transport engineering clusters, which together helped to mitigate part of the fall in output in the electronics cluster.

The construction sector grew by 5.8 per cent, after increasing by 6.7 per cent in the preceding quarter.

Services producing industries as a whole grew by 1.7 per cent, compared to the flat growth posted in the previous quarter.

The finance and insurance sector expanded by 3.3 per cent, a reversal from the 2.9 per cent decline in the preceding quarter, on the back of gains in non-bank loan volumes in the financial intermediation cluster.

The accommodation and food services sector grew by 2.2 per cent, similar to the 2.1 per cent gain in the preceding quarter.

The other services industries expanded by 0.9 per cent, rebounding from the 2.5 per cent decline in the preceding quarter.