Will Singapore's lacklustre NODX see better days soon?

Its flat growth is better than the 10.6% contraction a month ago.

Singapore's non-oil domestic exports may be on its way back to regaining strength as it generated a flat growth in August.

According to UOB analyst Francis Tan, August figures are better than the 10.6% YoY contraction recorded in July as well as the 3.3% contraction market expectations.

"The trend of a better export picture in August compared to July was also exhibited in the recent export numbers released in China and Indonesia," he said.

On a MoM basis, NODX fell 1.9% in the August following a similar contraction a month ago.

Tan argued that the problem with analyzing MoM export growth numbers is that it is unpredictable.

"It notoriously swing so much that one month’s excitement may lead to the next month’s disappointment. In the end, there is no clear consensus/conclusion on the state of the economy or export conditions. There simply is too much noise as one attempts to analyse y/y export numbers," he pointed out.

The analyst said cancelling the noise would give a better picture that the city-state's NODX is already on board to recovery.

"Zooming into the data since 2009, it also appears that NODX is on track to a recovery, as the trough of the current period of weakness was from Oct 2015 to Jan 2016, and it had been improving since," he said.