<p><b>Imports & Exports</b> <br>The XSI for Far East exports fell by 38.6% in May, down to 225.0 points. </p>
This is now considerably less than half of the index’s value at the end of last year. Compared to May 2022 the XSI® for Far East exports has fallen by 58.5%.
Demand for exports out of the Far East continues to fall year-on-year. The end of China’s Covid restrictions could have facilitated more positive volume developments out of the region, but without demand for its exports elsewhere, there is little to drive any extra activity. After posting two months of month-on-month growth in February and March, the latest reading for the Manufacturing PMI’s new export order sub-index has once again shown a decline. Prior to February, we have to travel back to April 2021 to see the last time the new export order sub-index registered growth.
In the first quarter of the year containerized exports out of the Far East fell by 10.5%. This is only a 3.3% increase from the regional exports recorded in Q1 2019.
The XSI® for Far East imports fell by 6.9% in May, down to 148.5 points. The index is now down by 28.6% year-on-year.