News
February PMI rises to 51.4
By ECCT staff writers
Taiwan’s official manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) for February rebounded sharply by 11 points to 51.4, interrupting seven consecutive months below the neutral level of 50, and thereby indicating a rebound from economic contraction to expansion ahead. According to a news release from the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER), the economy appears to be bottoming.
Several sub-indices are now in positive territory. Of the five components of Taiwan’s PMI in February, new orders and production are now in expansion, manpower employment tightened, supplier delivery times decreased, and inventories turned flat. Partly due to the low base period effect of fewer working days during the Lunar New Year in January, the seasonally adjusted new orders and production indexes jumped 16.7 and 30.3 to 51.1 and 62.4 respectively. The sub-index for the economic outlook for the next six months rose for the fourth consecutive month (although it remained below the neutral level at 44.7.
Of the six major industries, three major industries have returned to expansion, namely the food and textile industry (51.7), chemical and biotechnology medical industry (51.6), and basic raw materials industry (50.7). However, the two largest industry sectors are still in contraction, namely the electric power and mechanical equipment industry (45.3) and the electronic and optical industry (45.7) while the transportation industry is flat (50.0).
Meanwhile, Taiwan's non-manufacturing index (NMI) in February came in at 50.2, a slight increase of 0.1 month-on-month and the fourth consecutive month of expansion, indicating continuing economic expansion in the services sector.
