Singapore's October exports rise 22.2%, much stronger than forecast
The increase was led by non-monetary gold and supported by electronic products, said EnterpriseSG.
Cranes at Pulau Brani port terminal stand against the skyline in Singapore on Feb 25, 2025. (Photo: AFP/Roslan Rahman)
This audio is generated by an AI tool.
SINGAPORE: Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) rose by 22.2 per cent in October from the same month a year earlier, Enterprise Singapore said on Monday (Nov 17).
The increase was led by non-monetary gold and supported by electronic products, said EnterpriseSG.
The export growth compared with a Reuters poll forecast of a 7.5 per cent increase, and followed a revised rise of 7 per cent in September.
NODX rose by 4.1 per cent in the first 10 months of 2025, according to the media release.
Electronic NODX expanded by 33.2 per cent in October, extending the 30.4 per cent rise in the previous month.
Integrated circuits, personal computers and disk media products contributed the most to electronic NODX, expanding 40.9 per cent, 77.7 per cent and 31.4 per cent respectively.
Meanwhile, non-electronic NODX expanded by 18.8 per cent in October, following a 0.5 per cent increase in the previous month.
The growth was driven by non-monetary gold, specialised machinery and pharmaceuticals, expanding by 176.8 per cent, 16.1 per cent and 25.2 per cent respectively, said EnterpriseSG.
Among key markets, exports to Taiwan, Thailand and Hong Kong rose strongly, while shipments to the US were lower than a year earlier.
NODX to Taiwan expanded by 61.5 per cent in October, extending the 31.9 per cent rise in the preceding month, said EnterpriseSG.
Meanwhile, NODX to Thailand and Hong Kong rose 91.1 per cent and 66.6 per cent, respectively.
On a year-on-year basis, total trade expanded by 23.2 per cent in October, extending the 14.6 per cent rise in the preceding month.
Ms Selena Ling, the chief economist and head of global markets research and strategy at OCBC, said that October's NODX expansion was the fastest seen since November 2021.
She added that the data for integrated circuits, personal computers and disk media products exports suggested "still resilient demand" for the artificial intelligence-led electronics boom.
Zooming in on exports to China, Ms Ling said last month's narrow expansion of 0.1 per cent likely reflected the "growth challenges in the Chinese domestic demand story" and could foreshadow "further weakness to come since NODX has been swinging between expansion and contraction for most of this year".
She also flagged that NODX to the US declined for a sixth straight month, with a 22.8 per cent decline in non-electronics NODX being "illustrative of softening US domestic demand" in the segment.
Ms Ling said that OCBC had upgraded its full-year 2025 NODX growth forecast to 4 per cent year-on-year, as its earlier 2.5 per cent forecast "looks likely to be conservative" given the "significant outperformance" in October's NODX.
"If our 4 per cent NODX growth forecast materialises, this is a huge improvement from 0.2 per cent growth in 2024 and would mark the fastest pace since 2021," she said, noting that NODX grew by 12.1 per cent that year.
Ms Ling added that OCBC's NODX growth forecast for 2026 remained at 1 per cent to 3 per cent, "given the high base in 2025".
"The uncertainties for the 2026 outlook revolve around the US growth slowdown and (the) Fed's interest rate trajectory; potential US product-specific tariffs, which (are) driving some re-shoring and (foreign direct investment) back to the US; and the ongoing volatility in the AI industry, just to name a few (things)," she said.
