Malaysia’s Leading Index (LI) increased 0.4 per cent to 109.6 points in October 2022 (October 2021: 109.2 points) an increase of 0.4 index points.
The Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) stated the increase was supported by the Number of Housing Units Approved and Real Imports of Other Basic Precious & Other Non-ferrous Metals.
DOSM’s ‘Malaysian Economic Indicators: Leading, Coincident & Lagging Indexes October 2022’ report, released on Dec 23 state that based on the monthly performance, LI recorded a negative 0.3 per cent in the reference month compared to a negative 1.3 per cent in September 2022.
This trend was driven by the Bursa Malaysia Industrial Index (0.6%) where Real Imports of Semi-Conductors rose (0.3%), along with Real Money Supply, M1 (0.1%) and Expected Sales Value, Manufacturing (0.1%).
Looking at the smoothed long-term trend in October 2022, LI started trending below the 100.0 point trend. Accordingly, the Malaysian economy is expected to start moderating in the months ahead in 2023, the impacts of global economic uncertainty.
As for the current economic position, the Coincident Index (CI) recorded an increase of 6.5 per cent year-on-year to 120.5 points in October 2022 (October 2021: 113.1 points). On the other hand, the monthly change in CI recorded a decrease of 0.6 per cent caused by the decrease in the Industrial Production Index (-0.4%), Capacity Utilisation, Manufacturing (-0.3%) and Real Contributions, EPF (-0.1%).
The Diffusion Index for IP shows a decrease in October 2022 to 14.3 per cent compared to 28.6 per cent in September 2022. The Diffusion Index for IS also recorded a decrease to 33.3 per cent.
