No hope in sight for Singapore exports in 2016

Sluggish numbers won’t recover, analysts say.

There’s little chance that Singapore’s exports will rebound next year, after a particularly dismal showing in 2015.

Analysts at BMI Research highlight that export growth will remain lacklustre on back of weak global demand and domestic restructuring pains.

“We see little prospect for a significant recovery in Singapore's export growth over the coming year amid poor external demand conditions and ongoing domestic structural difficulties,” BMI Research’s report.

In particular, Singapore's largest export market China is in the midst of a protracted slowdown, the effects of which have been reflected in the city-state's shipments to the mainland.

Meanwhile, trade flows to the US have been only marginally better, with NODX to the world's largest economy--Singapore's second largest export market--falling for the second straight month at a pace of 2.2% year-on-year.

“Singapore is facing both a cyclical slowdown in global trade as well as structural domestic difficulties, both of which have acted as a drag on non-oil domestic exports (NODX) and industrial production. Reflecting this difficult outlook, industrial production growth sank to a fresh three-year low of -5.3% y-o-y in October, suggesting that manufacturers continue to struggle in the face of the myriad headwinds,” BMI Research said.