Here's the only good news in Singapore's dismal industrial production

It fell 2.4% excluding biomed output.

According to Nomura, industrial production surprised markets on the upside increasing by 2.1% y-o-y in May, albeit down from an upwardly revised 5.0% y-o-y in April (Consensus: 0.1%; Nomura: -0.9%). The key driver remained biomedical output, which rose by 22.8% y-o-y from 41.9% in April.

Nomura said that excluding this, IP fell by 2.4% y-o-y, following a drop of 2.7% in April. That said, there were still some encouraging signs as IP growth on a sequential (month-on-month, seasonally adjusted) basis remained in positive territory (1.3% in May from 3.6% in April). In addition, electronics output rose for a second straight month, by 4.3% y-o-y in May from 1.6% in April.

"This however remains at odds with electronics exports, which are still contracting (-13.2% y-o-y in May from -9.0% in April)," Nomura said.