KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 18 ― Malaysia has halted a two-year slide in consumer confidence, with the local outlook improving even as Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia became more pessimistic, according to a global survey released last week.
The Mastercard Index of Consumer Confidence, which measures the robustness of Asia Pacific markets for the first half of 2016, found that Malaysia along with Philippines and India recorded improvements of at least five points compared the previous survey from late 2015.
Taiwan recorded the largest gain of 16.3 points to 45.3 points, going from the lowest among the 17 Asia-Pacific markets in the previous survey, while the biggest decline in optimism levels was observed in Indonesia, followed by Hong Kong, and Singapore.
Between June and July this year, a total of 8,746 respondents aged 18 to 64 in 17 Asia Pacific markets were asked to give a six-month outlook on five economic factors- the economy, employment prospects, regular income prospects, the stock market and their quality of life. The Index is calculated on a scale of 0 to 100, with zero as the most pessimistic, 100 as the most optimistic and 50 as neutral.
Malaysia's gains in consumer confidence puts it at 41.4 points (neutral status), an improvement of 9.5 points from the previous survey where consumer confidence was ranked as "pessimistic".
Malaysia also recorded increases in all five economic factors and gained more than ten points in its stock market and quality of life outlook.
“Overall consumer confidence in Asia Pacific has shown marginal change with some economies facing headwinds, but the region’s emerging markets including China, India, Vietnam, Myanmar and the Philippines remain resilient with consumers expressing optimism about economic prospects over the next six months.
"Even as emerging Asia continues to drive the region’s growth, governments and businesses need to ensure stability and strong fundamentals in order to weather future external shocks," Eric Schneider, senior vice president, Asia Pacific, Mastercard Advisors, said in a statement accompanying the survey.
The survey said that overall consumer confidence in Asia Pacific holds steady, showing stability in nine of the 17 markets.
The developing markets of India (97.6), Philippines (95.2), Vietnam (94.9) and Myanmar (99.8) remain extremely optimistic in their outlook, while declines were recorded in seven out of 17 Asia Pacific markets, with significant deterioration seen in Indonesia (-14.7), Hong Kong (-12.4) and Singapore (-10.7).
The decreases recorded in Hong Kong, Japan (-8.8) and Singapore moved these markets from neutral into pessimistic territory
