Joint session between ministries to be held in preparing Budget 2021
According to Samir Dixit, managing director of Brand Finance Asia Pacific, the Malaysia 100 Brands 2020 ranking remains very top heavy this year and hopes to see a more diverse mix at the top and more significant brand value increases at the bottom. To do so, brands must start to focus on building both brand value and strength, rather than being sales and offers driven. These tactics will help in the short term but might destroy the long-term value and strength of brands. It is the brand strength for most Malaysian brands that remains a concern – these have remained stagnant this year. Brand has to be a strategic agenda for senior management and boards and must be treated like any other business asset and not just a legal trademark. See the complete ranking from pages 13 to 19.
Joint session between ministries to be held in preparing Budget 2021
According to Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Aziz, a joint session will be held between ministries to discuss proposals as well as the operational and development needs in relation to Budget 2021. The Finance Ministry is in the process of drafting Budget 2021, which will be tabled on Nov 6. Economic continuity would be given priority to ensure the momentum of economic recovery was maintained. The government calls on the people to work together in combating the COVID-19 pandemic by always practicing the new norms and physical distancing, maintaining hygiene and health, as well as be disciplined in complying with the standard operating procedures issued by the government. The government was constantly monitoring developments on the COVID-19 situation and was always ready to increase allocations, as and when needed. The government has allocated RM1.7 billion to combat the spread of COVID-19, channelled via 14 ministries and state governments. The government, through the Health Ministry, has also channelled an additional allocation of RM44 million to strengthen Sabah’s healthcare front-liners. Apart from that, the government, through the National Security Council, recently approved an additional allocation of RM50 million to the National Disaster Management Agency (NADMA). These additional provisions are in line with the commitment to ensure preparedness in the face of increasing COVID-19 infections nationwide. Meanwhile, 11.36 million people had successfully received RM50 in their eWallets, amounting to RM567.9 million, under the RM50 eWallet credit programme that ended on Sept 30. The eWallet providers such as Boost, GrabPay and TouchnGo eWallet had also contributed benefits in the form of credit matching and various other incentives, amounting to RM433.8 million, in an effort to boost the Malaysian economy.
China remains Malaysia’s largest foreign investor in manufacturing sector
According to Deputy International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Lim Ban Hong, China remains Malaysia’s largest foreign investor in the manufacturing sector for four consecutive years since 2016, with 32 foreign direct investments (FDIs) amounting US$452.43million approved in the first six months of 2020. Malaysia approved 79 FDIs worth US$3.74 billion from China in 2019. In terms of total trade, the bilateral trade between Malaysia and China stood at US$80.06 billion from January to August 2020, while in 2019, the two-way trade hit US$123.96 billion. Despite the current Covid-19 pandemic, Malaysia and China continued to show sincere friendship to support each other and overcome difficulties together in these trying times. It is hoped that the corporate elites from both countries would continue to collaborate in sectors such as digital economy big data, innovative economy, as well as industrial innovation and modern agriculture.
DOSM expects Malaysian economic recovery to continue
According to the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) chief statistician Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Uzir Mahidin, the country’s economy is expected to continue its recovery trend based on the smoothed growth rate of leading index (LI), a predictive tool to anticipate upturns and downturns in the economy. The LI registered 108.5 points in August 2020 from 100.8 points in August 2019, maintaining an annual growth of 7.6 per cent. However the LI slipped to negative 0.5 per cent, dragged by the number of new companies registered (negative 0.6 per cent), real imports of semi- conductors (negative 0.4 per cent), and the number of housing units approved (negative 0.1 per cent). Despite the softening LI for the reference month, the growth rate of smoothed LI is consistently above trend and moving upwards. This implied that the Malaysian economy is expected to continue its recovery trend in the months ahead. Nevertheless the downside risk to growth remained amid the recent spike in COVID-19 cases. Meanwhile Coincident Index (CI), which measures the current economic performance, anticipated a better year-on-year growth to register negative 2.3 per cent in August 2020 from negative 2.4 per cent in July 2020. On a monthly basis, the CI rose to 0.5 per cent supported by the increase in volume index of retail trade (0.5 per cent) and real salaries and wages in manufacturing sector (0.1 per cent). The current situation was supported by the performance of volume index of wholesale and retail trade which depicted a sign of recovery to register 130 points with a growth of negative 2.4 per cent year-on-year. This was the smallest negative growth since March 2020. Besides that, in terms of labour force statistics, the number of employed persons improved 0.5 per cent to 15.2 million persons, contributed mainly in the services sectors.
On The Markets
This week, on Thursday (22Oct), the Ringgit eased to 4.1495 against the USD from 4.1470 on Monday (19Oct). Meanwhile, the Ringgit was 3.0593 to the Sing Dollar on Thursday (22Oct). On Monday (19Oct), the FBM KLCI was up 14.27 points (0.95%) to 1518.11 from previous Friday’s close of 1503.84. As at Friday (23Oct) 10:00am, the FBM KLCI continued sideways over the past month at 1500.06. US stocks were higher after the close on Thursday, even as lawmakers worked to strike a stimulus deal but buoyed by a surprise upside on the economic data front, reduced jobless claims and higher home sales. The DJIA rose 0.54% to 28,363.66 while the NASDAQ added 0.19% to 11,506.01.
FBM KLCI 3 Years Chart
