Taiwan Business Indicators in December 2013
Press Release
National Development Council (NDC)
January 27, 2014
In December 2013, the Taiwan Business Indicators showed that the economic recovery was quite obvious, and the economic situation turned to stable. Among the indicators compiled by the National Development Council (NDC), the trend-adjusted leading index increased by 0.39%, the trend-adjusted coincident index increased by 0.51% from the previous month, and the overall monitoring indicator flashed the "green" signal.
1. Leading Indicators: With revised data, the composite leading index stood at 104.48, up by 0.51% from November 2013. Its trend-adjusted index increased by 0.39% to 101.80. Among the seven indicators making up the trend-adjusted index, the index of export orders, net accession rate of employees on payrolls of industry and services, real monetary aggregates M1B, and TAIEX average closing price had positive cyclical movements from the previous month, while building permits, the TIER manufacturing sector composite indicator, and SEMI book-to-bill ratio had negative cyclical movements.
2. Coincident Indicators: With revised data, the coincident index stood at 103.27, up by 0.62% from November 2013. Its trend-adjusted index increased by 0.51% to 100.61. Among the seven indicators making up the trend-adjusted index, real machineries and electrical equipments imports, sales of trade and food services, the industrial production index, the index of producer’s shipment for manufacturing, and real customs-cleared exports had positive cyclical movements from the previous month, while electric power consumption and nonagricultural employment had negative cyclical movements.
3. Lagging Indicators: With revised data, the lagging index stood at 99.56, down by 0.73% from November 2013. Its trend-adjusted index decreased by 0.84% to 96.99. All six indicators making up the trend-adjusted index had negative cyclical movements from previous month, which were the manufacturing unit output labor cost index, the inventories to sales ratio for manufacturing, loans and investments of monetary financial institutions, the unemployment rate (inverted), regular employees on payrolls in industry and services, and the interbank overnight call-loan rate.
4. The Monitoring Indicators: The total score in December increased by three points to 24, flashing the “green” signal for the first month. Among the nine components, the industrial production index and the TIER manufacturing sector composite indicator each changed its individual light signal from “yellow-blue” to “green”, the imports of machineries and electrical equipments changed its individual light signal from “green” to “yellow-red”, the index of producer’s shipment for manufacturing changed its individual light signal from “blue” to “yellow-blue”, each gained one point. The TAIEX average closing price lost one point the change its individual light signal from “yellow-red” to “green”. The light signals for the rest of four components remained unchanged.
~~ The next release is scheduled for February 27 2014 ~~