The global manufacturing activity recovery had seen a gradual improvement in late 2023 and is expected to continue into 2024 although it remained in contractionary territory after two years of downturn.
S&P Global Market Intelligence senior associate Benjamin Ng said that with global growth prospects picking up, the economic conditions are likely to improve and this could be observed from the global Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) data, improvement in the electronic industry, as well as tourism segment.
“We saw that the United States (US) economy is stronger than expected although the Western Europe sector continued to underperform. Growth in Asia Pacific (APAC) was uneven with India and Indonesia leading the region as the fastest growing while China was still struggling with multiple headwinds,” he said during a webinar organised by the Malaysia External Trade Development Corporation today.
He said global PMI data showed that global gradual improvement of economic positions, with indications of further improvement with new orders and future output indications rising to its highest level since mid-2023.
