Malaysia’s leading index up 3.8 pct in May, shows resilient economy

KUALA LUMPUR, July 25 (Xinhua) — Malaysia’s leading index rose 3.8 percent year-on-year to 114.2 points in May, illustrating a resilient economy, official data showed Thursday.
The Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) said in a statement that the leading index, which is used to predict economic trends for an average of four to six months ahead, maintained its positive growth for six consecutive months.
According to the statement, the improvement in May was primarily supported by a sturdy gain in the Bursa Malaysia Industrial Index (31.8 percent), followed by real imports of other basic precious and other non-ferrous metals (20.6 percent).
On a month-on-month comparison, the leading index also edged up 0.8 percent mainly contributed by the number of new companies registered (0.5 percent).
It is noted that the smoothed growth rate of the leading index in May remained consistently above 100 points, reflecting a resilient economy underpinned by increasing tourism activities and promising external demand.
As for the current economic scenario, the coincident index also maintained its growth momentum of 2.2 percent to 126.1 points in May.
The monthly change in the coincident index also registered an increase of 0.6 percent, bolstered by all components except the capacity utilization in manufacturing (-0.2 percent). ■