Excluding petroleum, domestic wholesale sales grew 31.3% y-o-y in 2Q2021.
Most wholesale trade industries registered growths in domestic sales in the 2Q. The Metals, Timber & Construction Materials industry rose 105.2% in domestic sales due to the low base last year when most construction activities were disrupted during the Circuit Breaker period which resulted in low demand for construction materials.
The Petroleum & Petroleum Products and Ship Chandlers & Bunkering industries saw improvements of 79.1% and 73.5% respectively, due mainly to higher oil prices.
Conversely, the Food, Beverages & Tobacco industry registered a decline of 4.8%, due partly to lower sales of grocery items as compared to second quarter 2020.
On a q-o-q basis, total domestic wholesale sales grew 1.2%, slowing down from the 27.8% q-o-q growth recorded for the previous quarter. Excluding petroleum, domestic wholesale sales grew 2.1% q-o-q in 2Q2021, also slowing down from 11.8% q-o-q growth for 1Q2021.
On a seasonally adjusted basis, the Telecommunications & Computers industry registered q-o-q growth of 17.5% in 2Q2021, due to higher demand for computer hardware and software locally. The General Wholesale Trade and Industrial & Construction Machinery industries also recorded higher domestic sales of 10.3% and 3.7% respectively.
In contrast, the Transport Equipment and Ship Chandlers & Bunkering industries contracted by 5.9% and 4.5% respectively due to lower demand for motor vehicles and ship bunkering.
Meanwhile, Singapore’s foreign wholesale sales grew 47.3% y-o-y, higher than the 11.9% y-o-y growth achieved in 1Q2021, mainly attributable to the low base in 2Q2020.
Excluding petroleum, foreign wholesale sales grew 22.8% y-o-y.
All wholesale trade industries recorded higher foreign sales, due largely to the low base in the corresponding quarter the previous year. The Petroleum & Petroleum Products, Chemicals & Chemical Products and Ship Chandlers & Bunkering industries saw growths in foreign sales of 100.4%, 45.4% and 44.6% respectively, due mainly to higher oil prices as a result of the recovery of the global oil market. The Transport Equipment industry expanded by 88.6%, due mainly to the lower base caused by weak external demand in the corresponding period last year.
On a q-o-q basis, foreign whole sales grew 5.2%, lower than the 17.2% y-o-y growth recorded in 1Q2021. Excluding petroleum, foreign wholesale sales grew 5.1% q-o-q, compared to 7.3% in 1Q2021.
After seasonal adjustment, most wholesale trade industries registered improvements in foreign sales in 2Q2021 compared to1Q2021. Among them, foreign wholesale sales of the General Wholesale Trade, Chemical & Chemical Products and Metals, Timber & Construction Materials industries rose 20.8%, 12.7% and 11% respectively, due mainly to the increase in commodity prices and higher global demand.
Conversely, foreign wholesale sales of the Telecommunications & Computers and Industrial & Construction Machinery industries declined 7.5% and 4.1% respectively, due to lower demand for mobile equipment and electrical & wiring accessories.
Photo: Bloomberg
